Although I probably have more than most, I find that it’s generally the case for people who tend to listen to quite a bit of music, that you/we will inevitably have quite a few songs, albums or even artists who either no one or very few people appreciate, but have a bit of a ‘soft space’ with you. These pieces usually aren’t the greatest in one way or another (and admittedly so), and, even more so, are probably SIGNIFICANTLY FLAWED to some degree (thus, the fact that you’re the only one who can seem to appreciate it) also. In Reggae specifically, I also find that such albums (especially for me) will usually come with a bit of an ‘underground’ vibes with them but not always. Speaking of albums specifically (which is why we’re here today), I definitely have quite a few which fall into this category for me, with one of the current PRIME examples being Sizzla’s 2001 album, Rastafari Teach I Everything. The RTIE album wasn’t his best and it contained quite a bit of Hip-Hop meshed with Reggae/Dancehall which I normally frown upon (even in Sizzla’s case) but I LOVE that album for some reason and it’s definitely grown on me more and more since the first few times that I heard it. Nowadays I (and probably I alone) list it as one of his top ten albums ever done and while I’m sure for the rest of my days I’ll hear people calling me crazy for holding the funky album in such high esteem, I really don’t care! Another album which I can’t seem to make the point about enough being as good as (I THINK) it is would be Jah Mason’s virtually ‘invisible’ Rise album from 2005 which NO ONE seemed to pay attention to. And, within the ONE that did, the album was quite polarizing as, from the very few opinions that were to be had, you saw a few people (like me) who thought it was amongst his very best material to date and even more people who just as firmly felt that it was amongst his absolute worst (and mind you, we’re talking about roughly fifty people or so altogether). RIDICULOUSLY, another album I find myself trying to support these days more and more is Dancehall superstar Sean Paul’s debut album, Stage One. For me personally, Stage One had to be one of the greatest PURE Dancehall albums of ALL TIME - No question about it. However, as it is almost inherently the ‘responsibility’ or the very nature of Reggae and Dancehall heads to reject almost anything which gains the title ‘mainstream’ (even retroactively as in this case, apparently), you’ll find the Stage One album gaining more and more appeal from the mainstream audiences who are still being turned on to it and unfortunately, considerably less by the fans who really know Dancehall. Again, if I’m the last man standing (like Kartel) in support of these albums, then so be it, but to me there’s just something about each and everyone which I like so much.
Still, if I had to point at a single artist who has so unevenly impressed and unimpressed with his output, it wouldn’t be Sizzla, or Jah Mason or even Sean Paul, but definitely Turbulence. The artist is so unique in this respect that I find myself literally both defending and criticizing his work very often and sometime, even at the same time. Right now Turbulence, in my opinion, is mired in one of the most ‘remarkable’ mediocre and downright bad stretches in recent Reggae memory as it’s literally been more than a year or even two since I’ve last heard a tune from him that really resonated with me. Luckily, however, things weren’t always so (and if they were, I probably wouldn’t be writing this review) as, a few years back the once downright PEERLESSLY talented chanter/singer once one of Reggae’s blue chip prospects and was, in my opinion, one of the strongest young artists in the game. In my opinion, his talents would all come together to produce what was arguably his most memorable album to date back in 2003, the Kemar ‘Flava’ McGregor produced Join Us album. That album was heralded by just about no one and I’ve read reviews calling it BAD and incredibly mediocre and things like such, but I was almost blown away by how good it was. In my opinion the Join Us album so easily showed off the great things about Turbulence’s style and it also showed off a then (and still) underrated lyrical ability from the artist who was back then just regarded as a Sizzla clone. The album didn’t do much of anything and today it’s just kind of a member of the pack of Turbulence albums for the archives, but in my opinion it’s so much better than that. That being said, Join Us wasn’t the only occasion of such an occurrence of one of his albums being all but totally disregarded for young Turbulence (who’ll be, hilariously, thirty years old in January. Has it really been that long???) by the masses when (at least to me) it was of higher quality than perceived. Perhaps an even more interesting and similar situation was the case just a year later in 2004 when Turbulence would push out the first out two collaborations with producer Spider Ranks and Love Injection, Words Of Wisdom. Now, you’ll recall back at the beginning of this review when I stipulated the various qualities that these albums which seem to only grab a very small group of people and are either completely panned or downright IGNORED by the masses, I also mentioned that such albums are not always exactly GREAT and, sometimes, they’re even “SIGNIFICANTLY FLAWED” in one way or another. That, even just on the surface, is Words Of Wisdom. It’s not anywhere near on the level of the Join Us or Rising albums and I could probably name quite a few others which I would rather comfortably rater over it in terms of quality, but for one reason or another, I JUST LIKE IT! Word Of Wisdom was definitely one of the more interesting and COLOURFUL releases from Turbulence’s catalogue and, no, it wasn’t the best, but I’m convinced that anyone who TRULY gives it a opportunity can see the same thing that I saw and continue to see in Words Of Wisdom.
Words Of Wisdom comes via the same UK based producer Rowan ‘Spider Ranks’ Johnson and label, Love Injection Productions with whom he would later work on the 2007 release Love Me For Me. In completely honest retrospect, the two albums weren’t that different. I still do prefer Words Of Wisdom; however, as Love Me For Me was quite BORING to be honest. Turbulence’s Words Of Wisdom album although, again, not one of his best, got off to an EXCELLENT start with the first two tunes, the first of which is one COOL lovers tune, All Mine. The song is just so sweetly vibed and as much criticism as I give Turbulence these days (and will probably continue to give him for the near future) for pushing incredibly average and boring love songs, I feel the need to stress what All Mine (and the tune which follows it) was because it was one of his better and most unfortunately overlooked tunes in my opinion in a lovers style. Nice opening. Next up is the even better title track (which should’ve been called Come As You Are, I’m sure) which is downright dazzling at times. The tune is less so a straight forward lovers tune, although it definitely does have those type of elements to it, and more so a tune for the upliftment of the Afrikan Woman (the youths in specific) as Turbulence urges them to eschew what society has grown to tell them is beautiful and acceptable and to simply, “come as you are, no liners, no lipstick. Come as you are, cause natural, is the mystic”. Big tune and although I want to reserve it, it’s the album’s best tune altogether. Things don’t even start to go wrong until the tune Gifted, which SOUNDS SO NICE with it’s classic vibes, but Turbulence then goes off the deep end, making it a point to stress just how TIGHT his woman is and he does save it from drifting completely, but you just can’t help but feel that he just told you something that he didn’t really need to. Otherwise, pretty good opening and a nice stretch for Words Of Wisdom.
As I said, Words Of Wisdom is definitely not without its odd and flawed moments and the lion’s share of such moments come during the late first and through the second half of the album. The second sign of ‘trouble’ (after Gifted) is the tune All I Have To Give which is just. . . I don’t even know what to call it. It’s cabaret music??? It’s just ENTIRELY too sappy and overemotional in my opinion and although the riddim is quite nice, you’re just really never able to appreciate it after Turbulence delivers the sappy love song across it. Not too far from that is the folksy sounding Tears Fall which is a conscious tune but one which you almost have to struggle to get something from and not because (as is typically the case) it’s just so dynamic or catchy, but it’s the exact opposite actually. Tears Fall is just boring. And then there’s All About You. . . This tune doesn’t start off too bad (I GUESS), but it slowly but surely starts to fall apart at the seams. Ultimately, the tune reaches rock bottom during the second verse which Turbulence begins by saying, “”Release it, let me squeeze it, I really need it. Let me feed it, WITH SOME SEMEN, I really need it girl” . . . yeah. Okayyyyy. Moving on: I also wasn’t too fond of Good Girl which starts well enough but doesn’t go too far and although it’s probably a step up from any of the others in the ‘not so good’ category, the tune could have been a little better also. But there are good things also, THANKFULLY. Most notably worth mentioning are the three consecutive tunes which roll out just after the opening of the album. The first is the COOL home going anthem, Repatriation. The tune is probably one of the most catchy and infectious songs of it’s type and Turbulence definitely doesn’t sacrifice the actual message, which is top notch throughout for his vibes and I REALLY like a later stretch when he turns up the intensity quite a bit before simmering back for the chorus. Big song and one of the best on WoW. Immediately following Repatriation is the uplifting Raspect Due. I can definitely see such a tune coming through as controversial to a degree but the vibe here is just so strong in my opinion, even if there are some bits that I may not agree with, the prevailing message on Raspect Due is an upful one and that’s a nice vibes to my ears. Come A Long Way isn’t as strong as some of the others but it’s still pretty well done in my opinion. The song (duh) speaks of just the various travels (on large and small scales) of people of Afrikan descent and how we must go forward amongst the fight and corruption still going on today. I also like that it assumes, for the most part, an aggressive stance, especially considering, for the actual flow of the album, that it precedes the aforementioned All I Have To Give (and the quality level also picks up considerably during the song). The classically vibed No Bloodshed is also a pretty good vibes and has become one of the more respected and recognizable tunes from Words Of Wisdom over the years. This tune is (as you mighty expect) an anti-violence piece at its core but it also speaks to general upliftment, almost as if Turbulence had a running tab in his mind of subjects to cover and quite a few (nicely) do get covered in No Bloodshed. The BIG sounding Danger is OKAY, it’s closer to being a good tune than a bad one but I really like the punch line on the tune, “DANGER! From you know not love”. And as WoW winds down it keeps two of the stronger tunes for the end, Keep In Touch and Rastaman. Keep In Touch is (admittedly) kind of sappy but catchy at the same time and ultimately harmless (you’re sitting there thinking it’s a love song and it is, but not the kind you’re thinking). And the LUSH Rastaman is simply on eof the best tunes you’ll find on the album altogether. “Them say a man is just a man but I’m a Rastaman, so there’s a difference. Bun out di imposter man. Hey! I‘m the Real McCoy, mi no actor man. You can‘t conquer them, you can‘t conquer man,” says Turbulence as he launches into the Rasta uplifting tune which nearly topples the title track (and it probably does) as the best tune on Words Of Wisdom and definitely supplies the album with a very big ending moment.
Overall, I’ll stress it again: NO! Words Of Wisdom is not Turbulence’s best work and it’s not even really all that close to it. What it is, however, is a colourful ‘middle of the pack’ type of release and for an artist who has more than his fair share of ‘middle of the pack’ type of albums to his credit, it still manages to stick out quite well for Turbulence. The album has virtually gone on to be forgotten, for the most part, but it did pop up last year as Spider Ranks and the powers that be at Love Injection have made it available digitally worldwide to the masses (and you should probably still be able to track down the CD if you know where to look). I take an album like this and push so much behind it because I really feel that it’s pretty good material and ultimately harmless on either side; And although I’ve WELL gone on to find a different role and place for Turbulence than the rather lofty one which I once ‘afforded’ him (as if he cares), Words Of Wisdom is still one which I have spot for and ultimately: I DON’T CARE IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT. I DO!
Rated 3.5/5
Love Injection
2004
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