#15 Baths - Obsidian

[Click here for soundtrack]

I love me a good loner album. Music I can just put on and lose myself in. Will Wiesenefeld (Baths) take us to a dark place. Like the one we all venture to when we think about what came between us and the person on the other side of a relationship. But he keeps his composure in his reflections and lulls us with drum breaks and layered effects reminiscent of his Anticon label mates Doseone and Dosh. The result is one of the most accessible Anticon releases; one that both production minded hip-hop heads and indie kids with an electronically-skewed palette can agree on

For an album that according to Wiesenfeld, aims to be "dark," it comes off upbeat on the 2nd track "Miasma Sky" and doesn't stop there. "Phaedra" is the most up-tempo track on the album and it touches on the forces that control our impulses, actions and desires:

Phaedra it is you that I
Owe all my lackluster
The thought of dying is
Dormant in me
Phaedra it is you that made meWe see the historian in Wiesenfeld, likening his unfaithful lover to the forces that control Phadera, who was cursed to lust after her step-son. It's his way of moving forward and assigning blame to a force beyond his control, maybe so he doesn't feel the pain. Baths explores themes related to the dark ages and it's almost as if he seeks solace from the negative by accepting the nature of it all. In the soundtrack to this post, "Ossuary," we see allusions to the black plague:

Once interred, in turn to turn to bone
Ribs like a house to the lord
Once interred, in turn to turn to bone
Bugs come to worship and hordesHe's a very calculated lyricist, but it's the beat that stands out on this track and the conglomeration of the different facets of his production. "Ossuary" has an industrial rock feel to it, like if Nine Inch Nails wore a smile and sped up their rhythm. Wiesenfeld hits high notes that stab melodically over the hook and the bass hits so hard. It's truly one of the more perfect songs I've heard

Despite Wiesenfeld's tongue in cheek passiveness, he still manages to really raise eye brows and go straight to the heart of the matter whenever he wishes. On "Incompatible" he so brilliantly copes with the difficulty of being honest with himself. He's in a relationship that's going nowhere, but it's still dragging on:

On the nights you roll over and introduce yourself
Nurse this erection back to full health
On the nights you roll over and introduce yourself
I am elsewhereWow. Dude's got some bite in him. What better way to describe the lack of emotion and apathy one feels in that relationship purgatory, then a flacid, infirmed penis? It speaks to the sexuality of his songs and the exploration of how comfortable he is with his own

It made me turn my head when i heard Baths was on Anticon, an avant-garde hip-hop label that i grew up with. Admittedly, i've fallen out of touch with their library, but Baths has brought me back. It shows me how the label has matured to cross wayyyy beyond hip-hop to feature an artist as universally talented as Baths to continue it's reign. If you need me, i'll be listening to old Anticon records with my headphones on
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To listen to any of the albums on our countdown, check out our spotify playlist here

Peep the archives of all of the albums reviewed up to this point

#14 is droppin' tomorrow!