I think that if I were about six or seven years younger and an aspiring Reggae artist, I would have a pretty good idea as to how I would want my career to progress, knowing everything that I know now. First of all, I would try to find a nice manager with whom to align myself and preferably one who has things locked down on the side of production as well, someone like Kemar ‘Flava’ McGregor or Shane Brown, for instance. After that, I’d attempt to keep myself physically and mentally prepared at all times, in order to take advantage of the sometimes strange situations Reggae artists (and musicians in general) often find themselves. From a musical point of view, although it’s impossible I know, I’d try to remain on point each and every time out in order to attempt to score as many early hits as possible to establish my name. Somewhere along this road, DEFINITELY, the mention of ‘VP Records’ has to occur if I wanted to help myself to progress along an international level through means of having an album. VP tends to favour artists who, although they may be young, have shown themselves to POTENTIALLY be in store for long careers through scoring a somewhat steady stream of local hits of varying degrees. Should you do so and ultimately sign with the label, you throw what is virtually unarguably the single greatest CONSISTENT brand of promotion within the Reggae community behind your name. Your face will plastered across posters across the globe, you’ll have albums released and not in a very long order (for the most part) (biggup Ding Dong) and with the thought being that Reggae artists don’t make very much money from album sales, but do their real business on the touring end, you’ll also have AMPLE opportunity to support your album by touring worldwide. Not to mention the money! Someone who could tell you quite a bit about how that entire operation might go for you would be one Mr. Mark Dyer [bka Warrior King] from out of Clarendon. The once EXTREMELY promising young chanter/singer established his name on the strength of several VERY successful big tunes (one in particular, more on that in a minute) and on the strength of the same body of work captured the attentions of Reggae heads worldwide, including those of the fine folks at VP Records. The label swooped down and signed up the young artist and, just as they had with so many before and with so many since, helped to push his name globally as his talent would have seemed to deserve. The union would also spur on two albums (of course), 2002’s debut Virtuous Woman and 2005’s Hold The Faith. Both albums were very well received (even though it took me awhile to catch on in terms of the latter), and, again, pushed Warrior King’s name even further.
The single relatively tangible downfall to signing with the big label that I’ve seen (and I’m not just ‘picking on’ VP either) is the blunted activity levels which seem to go with the deal. Not surprisingly at all, labels tend to want NEW(er) material. They don’t want an album with each and every tune a previous single, if they can help it, so a lot of times you get situations where some of the big artists aren’t always on the big riddims and just generally aren’t very active. Warrior King was DEFINITELY a ‘casualty’ of that. Like you currently see someone like Gyptian (to a degree) or I Wayne (PERFECT example) going through, if the King wasn’t very close to an album release, he just didn’t seem to be very active in terms of pushing new material. Also, as he signed SO early into his career, we never REALLY got to know him as an artist who could voice for almost anyone, thus, the mystery remains as to whether or not some of his inactivity in the studio was by Warrior King’s own choice or his recording status with his label. Regardless of the source of his past inactivity, the thing that we do know now is that WARRIOR KING is back and in a very very interesting way. I don’t actually know when his deal with VP was completed, but, again, not to stay on his inactivity, but even as a signed artist, Warrior King produced two albums in the last six years and not a single one in almost four, at this point. Just within the last few months or so, however, he’s had an increased presence within Reggae music. I was so delighted to see him featured on a tune, ‘Bad Boys’ alongside the legendary Linval Thompson (on which he uttered the unforgettable line, “can’t take ‘ini’, can’t take the ‘quity’ Rasta nah go dwell up inna Babylon city”) on his own comeback album from late 2008, the wonderful Ghetto Living. That album was distributed (digitally) through the peerless Zojak Worldwide and now Warrior King is doing the exact same thing as now ‘under new management’ Warrior King delivers his third studio album to date, Love Is In The Air for said new management, under a variety of labels such as Higher Level Promotions, Jadons Entertainment and Roots Warrior Records (which I would assume to be his very own imprint). What’s so interesting about Love Is In The Air is exactly what you might surmise from the album’s title: it’s predominately a lover’s album. Apparently the young veteran has either met a special lady or he has simply done something which he may have wanted to do for quite awhile which was previously not in the cards for him at VP. In either case, I’m SO less concerned with the King making such a move as I was when the oft-mentioned (around here) Perfect did so, with his album Karma (also on Zojak, incidentally) as Warrior King’s style has always been one which was far more easily transferable to the love song. Although both artists did originally rise to prominence on the power of a pair of STRONG lovers singles (Virtuous Woman and Handcart Bwoy, respectively), the King’s style, in all of his music, has been big and vibrant and beautiful and just something one would associate with a love song so, hearing him take this route isn’t something TOO far out of his skillset. That fact and the fact that the artist is and has always been just all around WONDERFUL to listen to helps to make Love Is In The Air, as brief as it is, a real winner by its end.
The first thing you might notice, as I did, if you just skim through the selections here is that the album has a very fresh vibes to it. I’m not saying that you’ll hear things that you haven’t heard or that this album is coming to “change the game” (whatever that means), but the vibes here are very new refreshing feeling to my ears definitely (and that’s coming from someone who is still WELL basking in the glow of the MASSIVE lovers rock piece that was Tell It Like It Is by Stevie Face, so you know that’s saying something). Up first to try and sooth your ears on Warrior King’s spanking new album Love Is In The Air is the title track which is very nice. It features an unnamed (on my copy) songstress who well compliments Warrior King (she sounds a bit like US R&B singer Syleena Johnson). The song does suffer a bit from the “love, dove and above” phenomenon lyrically speaking, but I like the duet style combination and it is a setup which is (kind of) revisited later on the album. SWEET opening. Things take a dip in the next tune up, ‘Pretty Lady’ which definitely isn’t one of my favourites on the album, but it isn’t too bad and I like it more each time I spin it. The tune has a bit of a Hip-Hop vibes to it which I don’t melds too well to the King’s style, but again, it’s not necessarily a bad tune and should I keep listening to it, it may actually grow on me someday. Not having a similar situation AT ALL, is the final tune at the birth of Love Is In The Air, the increasingly MASSIVE ‘I’m Cold’, which to my ears is the single best tune on the album. TEARS! If you, for whatever reason may not be able to be with the special person in your life (or you just don’t have a special person at this time) then you shouldn’t even listen to I’m Cold because it is my prediction that it will BREAK YOUR ASS DOWN! Period! The tune punctuates and uplifts and otherwise decent start.
Two of the songs on Love Is In The Air are apparently getting quite the push from Warrior King and company. Both tunes come complete with videos (even before the album drops, they’re two videos already) and, luckily are pretty good. The first to appear on the album is the COOL ‘Wanting You‘. This tune has a very kind of hypnotic and dazzling vibes to it and although it too tends to fall into the same lyrical pitfalls as the title track (“love, dove & above”), it doesn’t REALLY hold the tune back so much and it also seems like Warrior King had a very nice time singing it as well (and check the CUTIE who appears in the video). The other pushed tune ‘Wanna Give You Love’ is probably the better of the two songs (another CUTIE in that video also) as, although it lacks the sonic appeal of Wanting You (and that’s not to say it doesn’t impress on that level, because it does), is simply a more FOCUSED vibes. Wanna Give You Love is a ‘DEAL CLOSER’, if you know what I mean *(**wink wink**), trust me, I know. It’s also a very good tune and one of the strongest on the album. Similarly, the tune ‘Girlfriend’ is one which I was familiar with even before the two aforementioned singles as it was (I THINK) a piece from Max Romeo’s Charmax label (it even appears on their album ‘Charmax Allstars‘). And, you could make the case (and I will) that it’s even stronger than both of the other two. The vibes here are just so laid back and so ‘healthy’. I love the subtle Nyah drum almost hidden in the backdrop and it’s one of two or three songs here which made me question if my favourite tune, I’m Cold, was really my favourite tune. Yes, it’s that good. Although my wife liked it almost instantly (she’s a bit smarter than I am) the kind of frantically vibed ‘Hold Me’ is one which took a few spins to REALLY grow on me. I PROBABLY still wouldn’t call it one of my favourites, but again, each time I spin it back there’s something that I find I enjoy more and more (and I recognize this riddim or something about it from somewhere, I just can’t quite figure out from where). And then there’s the VERY interesting ‘Loneliness’, another tune which could give I’m Cold a run as the album’s finest tune. This tune is not only produced by Stephen ‘Di Genius’ McGregor of Big Ship (which I THINK marks the first time the King has voiced one of his riddims) as it utilizes his SPARKLING Forever Riddim, but it also features [Nateesha] Stream, the First Lady of House of Hits who I can’t seem to escape these days. These two sound EXCELLENT together as they deliver a message which not only speaks about the unfortunate condition of being lonely, but also how we should seek in The Almighty, for He is always with us. That’s a big tune. As Love Is In The Air begins to wine down, it saves two very strong tunes for last. The first, ‘Girl’ is guaranteed to have old school heads (and shoulders) bobbing and swaying IMMEDIATELY as it comes through SO nicely and sweet. The tune was literally made for the slow dance floor and it’s one of those types of tunes that will (or at least should) strike a chord within you if you LOVE Reggae music (it also, arguably, features THE line of the album, “Every female knows that dissatisfaction is the reverse of a reaction”) and it’s clearly one of the best songs on the album. Lastly is the HEAVY ‘Yesterday’, which comes across Lazeme’s nice Riverwalk riddim. This tune speaks of the closeness you have in a relationship and takes it to a broader degree and not just within specific moments in time. It also features a RIDICULOUSLY addictive saxophone which is constantly present on the tune, but also gets a nice little solo segment near the end of the song. Beautiful song and an equally beautiful ending for the album.
Overall, the only thing that I can say is that I wish Love Is In The Air had a little more ‘love’ to give. At just ten tunes, you kind of finish (especially with the final two tunes being two of the best) just when you REALLY get on a good vibes and, definitely I would have loved to see this one stretched to at least twelve or so. However, that being said, this album isn’t apparently the only piece on the trail for Warrior King as he reportedly also has already completed a Roots album for veteran producer Colin ‘Bulby’ York as well (which I cannot wait to hear at this point). It would also be nice if he could throw himself out there a bit more, Flava has an entire catalogue of riddims basically which I would absolutely LOVE Warrior King to voice (that’s not happening, but a man can dream). But for Love Is In The Air, it’s solid, it’s not the best I’ve heard from the artist, but I’m just so happy to see him back that almost anything would have sufficed. Luckily Love Is In The Air does a bit more than just “suffice”, the album is very well done, as sweet as could be and marks the return to action of one of the more talented faces on the Reggae scene who obviously isn’t doing too badly for himself post VP days.
Rated 4/5
Roots Warrior Records/Zojak Worldwide
2009
No comments:
Post a Comment