Citizen Cope
Every Waking Moment
RCA
By Jose Fritz
The descriptions never seem to do the man justice. He always comes off sounding like a hippie with a backbeat. When one describes an artist as sounding like “an R&B-styled folkie version of Wycelf Jean” people’s minds close, but what should a record reviewer do with an album of funky blues beats and socially-conscious jams? Your social politics are interesting, but ultimately the music has to deliver.
He fought endlessly with Dreamworks over his debut, The Clarence Greenwood Recordings . He felt misunderstood, mistreated and ultimately mismarketed, forcing him to bring in the lawyers, eventually buying back his own album. Ironicly, after all the fighting and the tension that came with the long wait for that album, it fizzled. The record’s lyrics came off as emotionally detached and ambigious without any personal connection. It’s Beatles-like passages were interesting yet incongrouous with the hip-hop feel of the song structures. To be succinct, there is nothing hip-hop about Ringo Starr.
His follow up was exactly the opposite, focusing myopiclly on himself, and entirely dedicated to hip-hop beats. It was clumsy, but the forced Beatles passages were gone and overall it had much better continuity. Tracks like “Contact” had a Tam!-like vibe that begged to cross over to commercial radio. The CD literally screamed “Play me mister DJ! Play my round shiny self between Jack Johnson and Stevie Wonder!” Unfortunately the rest of the record really devolved into a bland brand of R&B, but was a cut and paste pop song really what Mr. Greenwood is about?
I expected the new album to focus on the success of “Contact”. It would be tighter, poppier, funkier and have beats ripped off from Jimmy Smith. In the words of James Brown: “I didn't want them to swing, I wanted them to CHOP, BAH, DAH, BAH BAM, you know." Content is important but has to grab people as well, but that’s not what happened. Instead of predicatbly straddling the picket fence of white boy hip-hop, Cope totally commits to a persoal brand of woozy soul. It’s in this niche he succeeds and it is the truest he has been, winning a victory in refusing to pander and compromise. The result isn’t just an album for people who like relaxed reggae grooves, but also for those who think John Mayer is a pansy.
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