Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), is defined as a mental condition whereby a single individual evidences two or more distinct identities or personalities, each with its own pattern of perceiving and interacting with the environment.
Odds areyour favorite artist has a minimum of three distinct personalities, so what do you get when you are the child of an Army mother? Shape of Broad Minds, a pseudo group headed by Jneiro Jarel’s personalities: Jawwaad, the Houston-raised multi-instrumentalist (keyboards, trumpet), Rocque Won, the West Coast psychedelic singer inspired by Hendrix and Prince and finally, Philadelphian Dr. Who Dat, an introvert, record collector and studio wizard. Panama Black, the lone non-Jarel entity, is a rapper from Atlanta, GA.
The group’s most recent release, Craft of the Lost Art, is a 23-track musical exploration of how creative one can be when embracing the schizophrenia that dwells in a broad mind. “Light Years Away” starts the journey with futuristic, echo infused, off beat lyrics reminiscent of background music playing in your worst dream. “Let’s Go”, an interpolation of J Dilla’s soul clap combined with a multi-layered synthesized beat, features an all too brief MF DOOM throwing darts like, “so be it/ the flow is no Chinese secret/no MC speak it like the OG freak it”. “Changes” and “Opr8r”, maybe the go-to tracks on the album, have melodic beats that favor Outkast and harmonies that reflect “Don’t Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)” by the Beach Boys. The jazz scatting tracks, “It Ain’t Dead” and “Buzz Around Town”, although clever in lyrics, would not have been missed if they had not made the final cut. The same could be said for “There for Me” and “Lullabanger” but only because of the overused “I love my mama, son/daughter” song sensibilities.
This is a pretty dope album. And it’s jam-packed. So much so that creative songs with guest appearances by Count Bass D, Deborah Jordan and Stacey Epps could have their very own dedicated paragraphs in this review. The same could be said for the trip-hop instrumental, “Viberian Sun”, or the finger-snapping, distortion-of-static hook, “Stiff Robots and Drunken Horses”. Craft of Lost Art is that creative something, a sweet tasting treat to the palate which is our ears. An art found in the realms of a Broad Mind.
