Friday 18 November 2016

Old Man Saxon "The Perils" (2016)


Old Man Saxon is a Los Angeles based rapper who caught my attention with his untypical music videos. Staring at the camera with a blank expression, he shows us through his day living out of a car, visiting the cleaners, working as a dish washer and sitting on the john. Focusing on the odd, plain and usually unspectacular he makes a marvel of what is not in the visual medium. Either gauging on ice cream or rapping as a sales man it certainly caught my attention and I was happy to grab a copy of this EP.

The single track "The Perils" is fantastic, unfortunately the rest not so much. Saxon's rap style is dry, pale and steady, practically spoken word there is little oomph in his delivery and emphasis. Without the video his words don't have the same charm, they simply don't convey the same tone in message and story. On the other tracks I really couldn't follow Saxon's train of thought, there's a lot of hot air and foul talk between a string of lines and rhymes that didn't amount to much in my mind. it was in one ear and out the other.

The backing instrumentals were my favorite aspect of the EP. Two numbers were relatively jazzy and sample driven. The other two a lick more spacial and driven by odd vibes. "O.G Ghost" gets minimal with sparse drums and some light singing and has the records most incoherent lyrics, which I really couldn't get along with. Saxon shows a lot of promise with an interesting approach to his music in the singles but the other tracks here feel miles behind. Rather disappointed but it wasn't exactly terrible.

Favorite Track: The Perils
Rating: 3/10