MP3 Jon Watts - Mixed Vice Work

An ambitious parallel project from an emerging, powerful poet and producer.

6 MP3 Songs in this album (21:52) !
Related styles: HIP-HOP/RAP: Alternative Hip Hop, SPOKEN WORD: Poetry

People who are interested in Atmosphere Aesop Rock Anticon should consider this download.


Details:
"Mixed Vice Work" is a testament to the fluidity of art.

This EP, the ambitious follow-up to 2007's powerful and naked "The Art of Fully Being," parallels that project.

Recorded in a small cabin at a Quaker retreat center in Philadelphia, "The Art of Fully Being" marked Jon's transition to focusing on Spirituality in his poetry. The opportunity for community support at Pendle Hill balanced with quiet contemplation yielded such intense pieces as "This is the Ghost Jon Speaking" and "I'm Sorry Brian": reflective, emotional, honest and exposed.

Oh, the places Jon has been since then.

Emerging from the protective bubble of Pendle Hill and into the working man's world contained all of the pain of a death. Three jobs and four cities later, Jon is once again sitting down with his pen and inviting his muse to speak.

But this time there are some rules to Jon's word games... instead of working with an empty canvas, Jon is following in the footsteps of Chopin and Vivaldi, Aesop Rock and Slug to RE mix, RE vise and RE work six songs from "the Art of Fully Being" until they are their own standalone pieces.

This is NOT an album of remixes. Jon has re-envisioned every aspect of these songs: the instrumentation, the subject matter, the content, the notation, the production, the rhythms and the rhyme scheme. He has written poems that are pertinent to the here-and-now and playfully converse with the past. The metamorphisis is profound.


"See but now I'm looking for my value in my breath. I'm impressed - and I'll breathe this love until my dying breath is all that's left."

-from the introduction track, "Soul Food" - a reference to the line:


"But I was looking for my value in the things I had accomplished, like the women that I wanted and the ones that had fallen for me."

-from "I'm Sorry Brian" on "The Art of Fully Being"


Jon turns the previous content on it's head and examines it from an entirely different angle - without contradicting the original. As pain and joy can coexist, so too can the sarcastic and self-deprecating "This is Just a Song" from "The Art of Fully Being" - and its optimistic and reassuring call-to-art cousin from "Mixed Vice Work", entitled "Grab a Pen":

This is art and it's important
support it

It's not enough that you enjoy it
I'm asking you to join it

So if you're listening
grab a pen

write a letter to yourself
or to someone else

join the conversation
write a song or a poem

Learn to let go

-"Grab a Pen", Mixed Vice Work