Cassette Review // Mickey O'Brien "Orebody" (Hand'Solo Records)

https://handsolorecords.bandcamp.com/album/orebody

This cassette begins with these bagpipes which sound like they're playing "Amazing Grace" with words being rapped over them.   With record skips, the first song comes on after the intro and it feels like something from Suburban Noize Records, though I can't place a specific artist within these beats and rhymes.  

A more upbeat song comes through but "It's so hard to say goodbye" is coming through the background like Boyz II Men.   On "Antipathy" and name drops Flint, Michigan saying that there's something in the water.  The sax is going hard now.   Everything is reduced to just words and then hard record scratching comes into start the next song.

At one point I thought I had misjudged what song was what, but then they started singing "On Guard", so I know where I am.  This song goes hard.   Name dropping Canseco in an A's hat on the next song is quite fun as well.  "I'm one bad day away from going Joker mode" is something I feel we can all relate with right now.

As these songs have big beats coming through, they also bring in elements of R&B which I definitely enjoy.  It expands on the hip hop concept into something else like other artists have done before, but also Mickey O'Brien certainly has his own stamp on this sound.   In typical Hand'Solo fashion, this cassette features bonus remixes on the flip side which are all the more reason not to just stream this one digitally but buy the cassette as well!