If you're a little confused about the title, Kanji is actually a person. I met him in my dream. I will not tell you about what we did in my dream, but my experience with him was so profound that I decided not to work that morning because I wanted to stay with him as long as possible. I even remember waking up without learning his name so I went back to sleep and luckily, I dreamed of him again and that was when I asked his name. [Some of you might be thinking I may have misspelled what he said, but he showed me his name on his phone so that's really how it is.] Needless to say, this album is dedicated to him.
This happened during those months when I quarantined myself away from society. I wasn't in Facebook. I wasn't meeting any of my friends. I wasn't talking to anyone, not even to my family. It was a terrible time for me and this album contains many of the things I learned during that period. It's a thoroughly joyless affair. A collection of uncomfortable truths. Forgive me because this time, I am not going to whisk you away to a fantasy land or a nighttime road trip through the city. I am giving you a mirror. A heavy dose of reality. For you to see the terrible things which happen when we grow older that most folks in Facebook ignore or gloss over.
Sonically, I really tried to push myself to reach further and try other genres. And this is, perhaps, what I am most proud of with this album. The songs in here are all amazingly produced and I really like the vibe of the whole album. There is a consistent cohesive tone laced through all of the songs and I'm happy I was able to pull that off. I admit that there had been some taste issues with my previous album so I was hell-bent on remedying that with this one. I have to warn you though that if you're looking for some catchy danceable bops, I doubt you'd find anything in here. But don't mistake me. The songs here are great, but it may take you several spins for them to sink in.
I really love this album. I feel like I have invested a lot of myself in here. It's tough to be able to find the songs to be able to portray a specific human experience (with a legit narrative to boot) and I think I did justice to these songs by making them a part of this bigger story.
I have so much more to say about the background concepts for this album, but enough about my expositions. I'll leave you to experience the whole thing yourselves and figure out what this might mean to you. Here's the tracklist to give you a better idea of the theme. If I may say so, I think the songs get better (and louder) towards the end. But it's still awesome all throughout. After listening to the whole thing, I think you'll understand why I'm so damn proud of this collection.
01 Young Once
02 Electric Heart
03 In the Shadows
04 No One's Going to Heaven
05 Amerika
06 Rundown
07 Your Life, Your Call
08 Easy
09 #Grownupz
10 Let You Down
11 I&I
12 New Person, Same Old Mistakes
PS
Apologies for me being on the cover. Let it be known that if only I had a model, I would have gladly let him replace me but I really don't think any of my friends would be willing to volunteer. This album is focused on the individual, not on events or ideas, so a person had to be on the cover. And if the cover looks sinister and makes you feel uncomfortable, well, that's really what this album is about.
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DOWNLOAD THE ALBUM HERE
I would love to hear your feedback on it.
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PPS
I once posted something in Facebook saying I'm working on a really happy album. I obviously canceled that, but that album is coming next! It's actually almost done so the wait won't be too long, I hope.
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