May you bless house music, ooh lawd we pray...
Is this the house music revival I have prayed would materialize? Some of the downtown Greenwich Village sound familiar to my ears, body, and soult? Conjure up Jocelyn Brown, Connie Harvey, Larry Levan, Gwen Guthrie, et al; this is New York City-style house music from a Philly duo and perspective, thus the name of the label. Read on and feel what I mean.
It is amusing to see Helen and Terry on the CD cover, each wearing huge 1970s-style Afro hairdos (or wigs), walking up out of a subway station. "All Rize Got Soul? Then Dance" [Philerzy 001] just may fill the house and floor while singing praises to the God of the dance club... but as these things go, nothing is for sure here.
I like how the song "(I need) M-O-N-E-Y" rocks steady, as most of All Rize does; the choruses throughout are kind of churchy, which puts me on the proverbial fence. Listening overall however, I get the feeling that there is a combination of oversimplification and that they doth try too hard. Maybe it is their self-described "USB" or Urban Soul Beats, and for my tastes a touch too much soul and not enough sizzle via orchestration! USB might be Philly talk for Unlikely Sister's Benison – we'll see about that later.
One exception to the lyrical hubris is on the track "Bring It Back," seemingly the most true to their game song on this ten-track album. "Back in the day they used to party all night/ back in the day they used to dance all night until they got it right" They sing melodiously. You mean "we" still don't do that?? I didn't get the memo, y'all.
This 'sounds like we used to in my friend's garage with a drum machine and some chicks from around the way trying make a record' has me remembering that old cliché, "everything new is old." Maybe this will be bright new energy for you who are half my age. I'm eager to try it out on my unsuspecting but youthful admirer.
Female phantasias will feel the fear of being the object of a stalker's desire on "No, I'm Not Your Girlfriend," and it is actually kind of cute because of the tiny bit of attitude as opposed to the syrup usually applied by this genre nowadays. Later they extend a more sympathetic hand to a brotha who has been "Used."
I found the much ballyhooed "Caught Up * feat. Mia Cox" had a sturdier synthesizer mortar but was nowhere near another "Caught Up" from back in the day by Inner Life (on the Green 12" label) that featured Jocelyn Brown. Yes, totally different songs, but there is only one "Caught Up" for all times – and it is time for a title change with props to Mia.
I don't believe ALL will Rize if and when this is played in clubs coast–to-coast, but kudos to Bruner and Jones for piloting their own Philerzy Production Company anyway. A quote from the website bio, www.philerzy.com, says that they "feel dance music has suffered from almost eliminating the performing artist from the genre and focusing typically on the DJ." I must deduct a point for that inaccuracy here. Hey, don't nibble on the hand that plays your tracks, and artists are SUPPOSED to bring a live band whenever possible! That is not the exception, as All Rize apparently believes.
So, am invoking the Richter scale rules here with a rating of three-point-seven Mod Squad hair style stars. Who knows? USB might still mostly mean Unidentified Sistas Badinage and R&B, dance, and electronic music will live to play another day.
