Mello Music Group Records

Open Mike Eagle – Brick Body Kids Still Daydream [BRICK RED & CREAM VINYL] – New LP

$ 34.00

...wherever brilliant, avant-garde rap is appreciated. Brick Body Kids Still Daydream is his most overtly political work to date, and puts to use all the dazzling technical skills he's perfected over more than a decade at the forefront of rap’s underground.
<a href="https://openmikeeagle360.bandcamp.com/album/brick-body-kids-still-daydream">Brick Body Kids Still Daydream by Open Mike Eagle</a>

Brick Body Kids Still Daydream is a searingly political record for systolic political times. It chronicles the life cycle of the Robert Taylor Homes, a housing project on the South side of Chicago that was demolished completely ten years ago. Families that had lived under the same roof for three generations were forced to scatter, condemned by bureaucrats and faceless cranes and public indifference. Mike Eagle brings the Robert Taylor Homes back to life--literally, with arms and eyes and a head like the dome of a stadium--and fights until the last brick is made to crumble.

As always, Mike slips in and out of various grey areas; on the opener “legendary iron hood,” he raps, “you think it's all good, but it's really a gradient.” The nostalgia (“95 radios”) is a little bit painful, the triumph (“hymnal”) comes through painstaking, incremental work. Everything needs to be earned, even the radio signals that are picked up through tinfoil wrapped on children's hands.

The thesis becomes fully formed on “brick body complex,” where the hook is a towering statement of identity: “Don't call me ‘nigga,’ or ‘rapper,’ my motherfucking name is Michael Eagle.” But this is not a departure from the man-as-building conceit--the flesh and blood and brick and mortar are inextricable.

In case there was any ambiguity about the political and cultural forces that lead to the Robert Taylor Homes’ eventual destruction, Brick Body Kids Still Daydream ends with perhaps the most powerful song of Mike Eagle’s catalog to date. “my auntie’s building” is a tour de force. “They say America fights fair,” he raps. “But they won't demolish your timeshare.” This is the point: the decay and eventual destruction of public housing--and of the physical lives of Black Americans generally--has been normalized in a way that should be grotesquely absurd. “They blew up my auntie’s building / Put out her great-grandchildren / Who else in America deserves to have that feeling? / Where else in America will they blow up your village?”

Production comes courtesy of Exile, Toy Light, Andrew Broder, Illingsworth, DJ Nobody, Kenny Segal, Caleb Stone, Lo-Phi, Elos, and Has-Lo, who produces and guests on “95 radios.” “hymnal” also features a superb turn from Sammus, who maintains the same rhyme scheme throughout her defiant verse.

As grave as the album’s stakes are, it's still anchored by Mike Eagle’s irrepressible sense of humor. (His live comedy show, The New Negroes, is upcoming via Comedy Central.) “no selling” is a hilarious take on practiced indifference, and “TLDR” bridges the economic gap with withering wit: “If you was rich and ‘bout to be broke, I can coach you / ‘Cause I can show you how to kill a roach with a boat shoe.”

Eagle has earned rave reviews in Pitchfork, the LA Weekly, and wherever brilliant, avant-garde rap is appreciated. Brick Body Kids Still Daydream is his most overtly political work to date, and puts to use all the dazzling technical skills he's perfected over more than a decade at the forefront of rap’s underground. In chaotic and increasingly fractured times, it has a few crucial things to bring to your attention.

credits

released September 15, 2017

01 “Legendary Iron Hood”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Exile
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

02 “(How Could Anybody) Feel At Home”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: DJ Nobody
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

03 “Hymnal Featuring Sammus”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Andrew Broder
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

04 “No Selling (Uncle Butch Pretending It Don't Hurt)”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Kenny Segal
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

05 “Happy Wasteland Day”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Exile
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

06 “Daydreaming In The Projects”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Illingsworth
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

07 “Brick Body Complex”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Caleb Stone
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

08 “TLDR (Smithing)”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Illingsworth
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

09 “Breezeway Ritual”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Lo-Phi
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

10 “Wedding Ghosts”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Elos
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

11 “95 Radios (feat. Has-Lo)”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Has-Lo
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

12 “My Auntie's Building”
Written by Open Mike Eagle
Produced by: Toylight
Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev

Additional Production By Jodan Katz
Guitar by Dan Miller

Artwork by McKay Felt
All Songs Mixed and Mastered by Daddy Kev
Open Mike Eagle is Published by Wichita Songs/Domino Music Publishing

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