'An Inopportune Moment': A Review of "Keep Ya Head Up" by Jah Mason

Although such a thing was clearly much easier to deal with just a few years ago when we had a solid number of names offering upwards of three or four albums each and every year, I suppose that we, as Reggae fans, should be prepared and ‘equipped’ to deal with the occasional mishap of an album from some of our favourite artists. Back then, as much I do love the man’s music, I’d even have to admit that every Sizzla album was certainly no winner (although I could probably make a most dishonest case for each and every one being so if you really wanted me to) and that was also the case for Turbulence, even when he was good, and even the normally very consistent and dependable Luciano, Junior Kelly and Anthony B’s of the world as well. And now that those things have changed (unless your name is Vaughn Benjamin), although, like I said, one or two is excusable, it’s still somewhat more disappointing when you’re REALLY looking forward to one and now you have to wait considerably more than eight weeks or so for its followup. So with that in mind (and getting into specifics) wicked Manchester chanter Jah Mason didn’t exactly release an album in September or so - It’s actually been approximately two and a half years since he blessed the world with his most recent studio effort, the retrospectively increasingly unspectacular ”No Matter The Time” for Vikings. Also, if I’m being REALLY forthcoming (and I am), the album before that, ”Life Is Just A Journey” for Frenchie and Maximum Sound, although pretty good to my opinion, went largely ignored, so we can actually say that it’s been from 2006 when the Mason pushed ”Wheat & Tears” since he’s had a unanimously GOOD album release. Also, the UK based once might Jah Warrior imprint releasing a dubbed out version of his 2004 album, ”Most Royal”, didn’t really staunch the call for a next release much, if at all, so whatever the Mason was going to come up with next, at least hopefully, was going to be a big album and probably even one of his best. Right? Surely it wouldn’t exactly be the best time in the world (although no time would be) to pull out what is probably THE WORST ALBUM OF HIS ENTIRE CAREER. Right? But that goes without saying, so excuse for bringing it up.

Or does it??? Nope. Two or three years ago, or maybe even longer at this point, we began to catch notice of another Jah Mason album which was forthcoming from the Rastar Records imprint. Around that same time as well, the same label was reportedly going to be doing an album from Lutan Fyah also. These two albums were announced and put onto ‘coming soon’ schedules and pages long before they materialized and when the first of the two did show up in early 2009, Lutan Fyah‘s ”African Be Proud “, it wasn’t that good. The album had entirely too many Hip-Hop flavours and inflections involved behind the Fyah’s most straight forward of styles and . . . Yeah, it’s probably his worst release to date in my opinion. When dealing with that album and acknowledging that Jah Mason’s album, should it ever see the light of day, might also have a similar nature to it, what I concluded was that things would be different. Jah Mason isn’t as ‘rigid’ as Lutan Fyah, he offers a much more freestyling type of vibes and it was my thought that his album, again, should we ever see it, wouldn’t suffer from the same STRANGE sounds as the Fyah’s because of his versatility. That was my thought for the year+ between vibing ”African Be Proud” and FINALLY getting my hands on ”Keep Ya Head Up”, the loooooooooong delayed album from Jah Mason by Rastar Records, at which point it was revealed to me that although, ostensibly, I was actually correct in my assumptions, that surely didn’t mean that the album would be GOOD. Of course, it wasn’t just as simple as releasing the album either, even before we got to the music. After being scheduled (and then released for about forty-eight hours or so) digitally, the album was pulled a few months back and now it returns in the digital form and on CD as well, VERY curiously in conjunction with VP Records who is also, apparently, set to deal with Rastar in about a month when Midnite releases their third album with the label, ”Treasure”. Things weren’t quite clear sailing even when it finally did release either as quite a few sites, including some who’re actually selling it right now, have the album’s final release date listed as “December 21, 2011”, which is obviously a problem, but as the issues surrounding just the releasing of ”Keep Ya Head Up” mounted and mounted, it’s probably one of the lesser issues at this point. Far greater is the likelihood that people aren’t going to really like the music on this album. As I said, while it isn’t necessarily awkward and strange as Lutan Fyah’s project ultimately was, what it is is just bad. The Hip-Hop, still well intact, sitting behind the Mason just sounds really boring and unexceptional and it’s to the point where I could really (and comprehensively if you’d like) point out several of Jah Mason’s other less than stellar releases and show how they’re MUCH better than this one (I liked the ”Rise” album, but not a lot of people did and it’s miles ahead of this album), so I don’t just think that it is a matter of my not liking Hip-Hop because if it’s well done, I’d like to think that I can find big vibes in anything and they don’t show up here. I don’t want to make it seem as though the album is the worst possible thing I’ve EVER heard, but I do really dislike it when we take not only exceptional talents, but DYNAMIC talents, which is directly what Jah Mason is and has been since he hit his prime and this album methodically goes about DULLING him, for the most part. For his part, Jah Mason doesn’t exactly put his best foot forward on this release either and we’ll examine that as part of the anatomy of what is his worst album to date.

'Don't Back Down'

Throughout the album, sometimes attached to songs and twice on their own, there’re interludes and interlude-like pieces which are apparently added to help along the messages and to be honest, typically they do fine in that. However, the Intro which begins ”Keep Ya Head Up”, doesn’t at all. Normally the intro is looked at as setting the course for the rest of the album, but not only this one kind of goes after being more of an lead-in to the actual first tune, ’Don’t Back Down’ (which it doesn’t do very well either because far more specific than the rather broad subject matter of the song). The tune itself is actually okay and it’s probably one of the better on the whole of the album as Jah Mason and Rastar get it twisted by placing the obligatory acoustic set at the beginning of the album, rather than in its usual position at the end. The second tune, the obligatory mama song, ‘Mama’ (Reggae song #4,809,813 with that title) isn’t too bad either. It’s very average and unremarkable (although that riddim is ANGRY!), but as you’ll soon see, on this album, unremarkable, for the most part, means pretty damn good.

The skullduggery on ”Keep Ya Head Up” doesn’t begin until the third song on the album, ‘The Youths’, which is basically a Hip-Hoppified remix of a tune by the name of ‘Love How The Youths Them Live’ from the previously mentioned ”Most Royal” album, but that isn’t acknowledged as far as I can tell (and certainly not in the digital version at all), so the tune is kind of recycled and the new version isn’t very good either after the WICKED original. ‘So Long’, which is the longest tune on the album, checking in at more than six minutes, is another Hip-Hop track and, at least ostensibly, it’s the type of tune I expected to be here as Jah Mason isn’t at all troubled by the nature of the vibes, but what I expected was that a tune like such would be on the lower end of songs in terms of quality, because it simply isn’t very good and here, it’s a highlight unfortunately. ‘Nothing Can Stop Us’ is another such tune and it is actually worst than the tune which precedes it. I’m also convinced (although I’m probably wrong, as I usually am) that I know some of the song from somewhere. Here, the Mason is joined by an unnamed rapper, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but neither do their best (at least I hope the rapper didn’t do his best). ‘My Queen’ fails to right the ship any at all either and because of exactly what type of song this one is (a loving and honouring of the Woman type of song), it’s one of the most disappointing sets here because YOU KNOW Jah Mason can do MUCH better than this tune and do much better without being at his best. The tune is another which is just kind of . . . There. And the vibes around this one are pretty strange, making the tune sound kind of ‘funky’, which isn’t bad, but nothing special either.

'Wings of Wind'

If you remember back to the ”African Be Proud” album, you might recall how the album seemed to change right in its middle portion. What it did was flip from Reggae to more Hip-Hop - Well, ”Keep Ya Head Up” sort of does a similar thing, but in reverse and on a bit of time-delay as well. After another interlude, there’s ‘Computer’ which is one of the best Hip-Hop vibed tune on the album (and it FINALLY marks an occasion where the Mason begins to use more of a quality level of dynamic vibes and he does it, coincidentally, by just being more and more natural on the track. It’s still not high level material but we’re getting closer and closer. The title track moves us back several notches, ‘thankfully’, and reestablishes that status-quo level of ‘optimal’ below average vibes present through most of the album before it. Mason still doesn’t completely turn up the vibes on the album with the next two tracks, both of which are quite familiar. The first, ‘Wings of Wind’ [aka ‘Jah Take Us Home’] is decent enough and is his cut of Rastar’s Red Alert Riddim (which, incidentally, was also just released on an album via someone named Uhuru Boys Productions). And then there’s ‘Beautiful World’ which may be the most well known track here as it came over Rastar’s old self titled riddim (and when we first began to hear of this album, the riddim was relatively fresh. Now, it may be three or even four years old) (big riddim still, for the most part). This song features the Mason who is clearly just ‘going through the motions’ and seemingly uninterested in even attempting to bring his best and I believe I thought the same thing when I heard the tune for the very first time.

It isn’t until after twelve tracks and more than forty minutes into it when ”Keep Ya Head Up” takes a decided turn for the best (and stays pretty good), beginning at track thirteen, ‘Live As One’. The tune lays a most basic one-drop for the Mason and he builds a serious vibes over it speaking about unity in the world on a global (but very familiar and COMFORTABLE level). This tune, like the three which follow it is all but guaranteed to make the biggest impact amongst Reggae heads such as you and me, but not simply because it is a Reggae song - It is a GOOD Reggae song. Next come my two favourite selections on the album, ‘Love & Respect’ and ‘Tuff Down A Yard’. By the slimmest of margins I favour the former which is the best tune here and it is a GLOWING tune.

“Well do unto others as you want to do unto yourself
There’s always a lending hand when you need help
Some worship material, some ah worship wealth
Inna di hands of The Most High, that’s where I dwell
To my divine creator, no one compel
And if you know HIM well, then you can tell
Who show me principle?
Dem know Prince Emmanuel”

The latter is another excellent piece and for me, the ’argument’ between the two can go in any direction at all, both are very big tunes and shows that at least someone was trying to win here. The final track on the album, ‘Gwaan Live Up’, is quite strange, but its strangeness is helpful to make my point - I’m not trying to say that you need to make a straight forward album which doesn’t deviate from ‘standard’ Reggae music at any time. This tune is quietly all over the place and it’s still a quality piece. The vast majority of the album before is also very varied in nature, but it isn’t nearly this effective.

'Love & Respect'

Overall, if you cannot tell (shame on you) I’m not very high on this one. For what it is, as was aforesaid, it’s the single worst album that I’ve ever heard from Jah Mason (and I’ve heard all of them) and looking back at just how much trouble it seemed to take to FINALLY get out, it wasn’t worth it. The selling point here maybe the notion of trying to get Hip-Hop fans on board with the album, but as I said, I don’t think it’s just a matter of there being Hip-Hop on the album that I don’t like, I just think that it’s BAD and/or BORING Hip-Hop music which is the problem and placing someone like Jah Mason on a strange vibes just doesn’t bring out what he happens to do best and listening through this album, it also well inhibits it. I’ve heard much much worst than ”Keep Ya Head Up”, but I wish I didn’t have too long to get the taste of it out my head, unfortunately these days, that may not be the case. Skip it.

Rated: 2/5
Rastar Records
2010 CD + Digital