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| No one has the masterful dual delivery style of emcees Blake Knight and Playdough, and no hip-hop crew mixes tasty funk undercurrents and jazzy sounds like their collaborative organization ill harmonics. Laying down a deep groove and layering it with clipped, funky guitar playing, entrancing loops, and perfectly orchestrated vocals, ill harmonics' second album "Take Two" is artful but not pretentious, direct but stylish. From the jazz-bass heavy opening track, "Call Me In The Morning," to the smooth soul stylings of the next, "Back Side Of The Sun," just the few opening minutes of this sophomore release will have the contemporaneous hip-hop fan utterly hooked. Two years since their debut for Uprok Recordings, "An Octave Above the Original, Pt. 1," and through two major tours and appearances on movie soundtracks (including "Extreme Days"), ill harmonics have richly developed what made them unique in the first place -- the use of organic instrumentation, the fresh beats, and the cerebral but very direct lyrics. Blake adds, "The emceein' is a lot better, too. It's more organic but with a lot of the same elements, taking us light years beyond our first album. It is a good reflection of where we are as a group." The lyrical subject matter on "Take Two" is as prescriptive as the title implies. "Mister Christian" "talks about the struggles, triumphs, and even hypocrisy of the modern day church-goer, with a challenge to the listener to be a true Christian and act as Christ would toward people who might not be the same as you," Blake says. The delicately clipped acoustic guitar and stuttering breaks of "Back Side of the Sun" makes the song sound like anything one might hear on the best hip-hop station, and as smooth as any mega-hit, with words are an honest declaration of ill harmonics' mission. "It addresses us going after new horizons and going where no man has gone before, musically -- sort of like Star Trek!" Other topics include "faith, love of music, rockin' shows, travelin' the country, enjoying life, and self-reflection," Blake explains. The music that has inspired them lately includes everything from Blackalicious to Dilated Peoples, Sade to Sting, Jurassic 5 to Earthsuit, and The Roots to Tony G. ill harmonics finished "Take Two" around the same time they came off of the Festival Con Dios tour, a hugely successful traveling music festival featuring such bands as T-Bone, Audio Adrenaline, and The Supertones. "We played in front of thousands of people and met a lot of new friends," Blake says. "It was a crazy schedule but it was well worth it." Blake admits that in the middle of recording such great music andperforming for so many people, the most relevant thing to him lately has been that God has been showing him the importance of worship in his life. "That is the most important thing in a Christian's life," he says. "His timing is the schedule we must deal with, because His ways are not our ways." |
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