CHILO & B.O.K. – FACES OF THE MEEK AND FEARLESS EP Review

Faces of the Meek and FearlessBy SUNEZ #SkillastratorLO  The #PowerWrite

Brother, that drum got no skin left

Because I’ve promised to never say a word ever again.

But drums talk, made the slaves stalk, massa balk, I heard say Arawak

And so say every so muffled mondongo-mongo Santa sanitized hasta la ave maria!–

Barretto blasphemy! You gotta find the flesh of the willing cow and scrape a rhythm!

The more I hit skins, the less we say, the bitch basslines and whorish digi-ensembles muddle all the meaning.

Clave sin hueso, Boom clapped of all Bap?

SkillastratorLO called the world, more round in textbooks, but flat in the heart and width of mind.

#RespectFAKE, O, my palms won’t pound a letter for them.

I see you. Almost like every seed sent trife is fertilized with the promise of life,

a womb flooded with the disease of the weak made mean by plentiful cream

¡Horrores contra Lavoe!

You see I must give my word to never say anything so I ain’t ever saying nothing

When the qi is low in the orators of stolen forums, I only know the fearless to find comfort.

Campana in their cadence, tumbao in their tone, a wild worded timbale treks.

Y alla esta Chilo! He still speaks on.

Word. Fearless as Cardona’s conga adrift in the waters of the Nile.

Always for the oppressed meek as if boarding Clemente’s last flight again.  

Do the knowledge…

 

An ever growing collection of progressive tracks bundled into long players, Chilo, the Bronx Boricua MC’s work this #InvisibleRenaissance (2010’s) has wonderfully strayed from just keeping a battle status upstanding but challenging the songwriting parameters through diverse producers’ backdrops.  From the polyrythmic Salsa funk that dominates Mrompe Boca’s Stay Alive (2015)  to Mane Event’s scratchy treble snare backbone that guides his hard snap bap on 2015’s Magician’s Revenge to the full B-boy grooves of DJ Devi8tor Irs for 2016’s CNI.

An incredible orating poet, Chilo delivers every word as if consonants are the ever-evolving handles to whip a wild set of vowels whipped at breaks. Through B.O.K.’s driving, thickly guitar riff of “Driven,” he battles in varying phrase lengths while that energy in tone is taken to the pigs muddying on “Disorderly,” with a vaudevilled baritoned horns for a blue circus event.

chiloThe narratives are potent and completely thought out and reveal Chilo’s ability to use his charismatic fluctuations to the most subtle effectiveness. First, there is the sad trilogy of portraits on “Inadequate,” where the young student is disenfranchised by socioeconomic oppression, the sister mentally abused by her man leading to drug abuse and that ol’ man who won’t get digital, obsolete in his analog loafers.  Then turning to the murder mystery on Inquisitie,” where the conversational detail of “Inquisitie” turns the tale to an intimate, surging narrative. Ultimately, to be continued, his idiosyncratic flow, including perfection punctuations, paints a whodunnit with character interaction and observed clues noted, “Told Bobby he ain’t never lied/ i knew the situation was ready to be viewed with extra eye/cause it was more than just a hunch/truth is, things been strange for more than a couple of months/…”

Faces of the Meek and Fearless alternateJust as his other works, the musical challenges signify a thematic core of Chilo’s living catalog being born.  The tinkered guitar plucks, cascading horns and vibrating drums set a Ska palette for Chilo on  “Live it Up” he stays midtempo “reading about Siddhartha and blessing neighbors/The Harder They Come/human being charged from the Sun/beautiful freedom what these bars have become…” The stinging sharp and distantly sparse 1, 2 breaks, rock funk smashes and unifying scratches on “24Seven” show Chilo’s vocal presence through noisy illness. With the digi funk of “Trouble” with a high trebled, snare pop and Bootsy like guitar plucks, we realize that B.O.K.’s successful use of the searing guitar licks inspired Chilo from stories, battles and the the lovely lady pictorials of the said track.

Chilo is an MC can only be appreciated as a great of the #InvisibleRenaissance if we compile his published literature (Closed Doors & Opened Windows), his spoken word performances and this ever increasing catalog of albums with producers of varied aural stylings. Add these all via the proper amazement paid to the degree of difficulty, the angles of illness used attacking them and the bedrock of righteous content that edutains it all together. Chilo summed Art. Faces of the Meek and Fearless is just a little more of that continuing fight for the former with the mentals of the latter.

Sunez Allah #SkillastratorLO of the LO LIFES

LO LIFE logo#LOVEandLOYALTY A #LoLife

The organization of these principles around a counterculture, an expressive arts of creation that uplifts the ideas and thoughts of an oppressed people, is why I’m an honored builder amongst legends, knighted by heroes of Medina (Rakim Supreme Shabazz Allah/Rudy Lo, Thirstin Howl the 3rd, Bonz Malone) to further create in my element as a Hip Hop Writer of #ArtOnArt & #ScienceOnMusic. So the world may find love that locks in with the action of loyalty though they may never find another writer with my kind of grammar…

 

Representing the pillars of:

#KnowledgeOfSelf

#LoveAndLoyalty

#OriginalCreativity

Peace, Sunez Allah

#SkillastratorLO #PowerWrite