Customer Reviews

Human the Death Dance

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I love Sage Francis. I just wanted to get that out of the way before all of you dismiss me as a "hater" and hit the "not helpful" button. That's exactly why this album disappointed me as much as it did. Personal Journals was a revelation for me. At the time that I first heard it, I was basically your average white kid trying to convince himself he could be a gangsta rapper one day. Personal Journals was my window into a newer, more fulfilling world of hip-hop, a soulful, poetic, sometimes beautiful album unlike anything I had heard before.

A year after I first heard that album, a year in which I had familiarized myself with the likes of Atmosphere, Aesop Rock, Brother Ali, El-P, and the long list of names most of you are doubtlessly familiar with, A Healthy Distrust arrived. Here was an entirely different album, a fiery, politically motivated, intelligent album which showed a side of Sage only touched upon in previous outings. It was still definitively Sage Francis, but it was a unique album in its own right, with a new sound and a new message. It represented what every album for every artists ideally should: artistic development.

Between then and now, my musical tastes have branched out and changed. I've looked through all of the "Sick" series and "Hope." These albums provided me with some good material, and some skippable material. I've branched beyond hip-hop. I've found new hip-hop. When I heard that Sage was planning a new album, I was understandably excited. I got the package from Strange Famous a few days after the album hit shelves, and popped it into my computer.

It started off slow. The intro was pointless. Through all of "Underground for Dummies" and "Civil Disobedience," I desperately tried to convince myself that he was just recapping for new fans, and the new stuff would come soon. My hopes picked up with "Good Fashion," but then immediately came crashing back down. By the end of "High Step," I had heard very little that I hadn't heard before.

I don't really know what happened here. This isn't a new album. This is the artistic equivalent of a greatest hits collection. I mean, it's obviously better than the crap playing on BET, but...I shouldn't be forced to say that. I mean, this is Sage Francis. I shouldn't be forced to make excuses.

I will say, though, that there's something bigger going on just beneath the surface here, something that, if expanded, could easily have been the best album Sage Francis has ever made. It's hinted at in "Good Fashion" and "Water Line," evident in "Black Out on White Night," and present in its full glory in "Going Back to Rehab," which is, in my opinion, the best song Sage has ever written. If Sage had released those four albums alone as an EP, I probably could have called it the best thing Sage has ever done. Those songs represent the artistic growth I had been looking for, a more mature, thoughtful sound. As a whole, though, this album is going to be a disappointment for most Sage Francis fans.

I honestly hope he isn't growing stale or losing his touch. He's too talented and intelligent an artist to allow himself to stagnate like this. I'm interested to hear what he does next. Perhaps when all is said and done, this will be remembered as no more than a flat point in an overall accomplished and forward-moving career.

The final verdict: buy it for the high points and to support a talented artist, but...for any eager fans, this isn't the next step you were waiting for.

It's hard to follow up a brilliant album like "A Healthy Distrust," but somehow Sage has done it.

Mixing traditional hip-hop production with unique new beats (or lack thereof in the songs produced by Mark Isham) "Human the Death Dance" is a solid mix tape of Sage's past albums and personas. But rather than mix old songs, it's entirely new (and in many ways), groundbreaking, material.

Simply put, it's everything you've ever wanted to hear from Sage Francis on one album. And if you've never heard him before, it's a crash course in Strange Famous himself. There's something for everyone here.

And stop callin' it emo...waaahhhh.

If you've heard Sage Francis before and you're considering buying this album, do yourself a big favor, and buy it.

Before I got this album, I had only heard about 8 songs of his from several years ago (Majority Rule, Hey Bobby, etc.). I thought that his stuff was great, but like my expectations of a lot of independent artists, I thought that it was probably just a fluke. You know, the artist fades into obscurity, never advancing.

Well, Sage proved me wrong on this one. He's advancing by leaps and bounds.

This album, Human Death Dance, brought back everything I learned to love about hip hop: Braking the mold, Love of fresh word & rhyme, beats and music that make you realize what you are hearing is totally new.

It starts off with a cool little montage of old recordings he had of himself rapping when he was a kid - then the next track "Underground for Dummies" is a summary of his experiences starting out, his naivete as his strength, managers, etc... his influences (very cool). The background music sounds like nostalgic memories (hints of 80's pop music?) with the end result being a sound in hiphop I've never heard before. It's timeless and an instant classic.

I could go on for every song on this album ("Clickety Clack" blew me away!) but I recommend you get this album, open the lyrics book that comes with it, strap on your headphones, and enjoy the ride.

It's one of those albums that will remind of you of this summer, years into the future.

Let me start off by saying that I am a FAN of sage francis. I love his music, his words, his ideas, his creativity. I could go on and on giving him praise but this is a review on a cd i found to be dissapointing.
Perhaps my hopes were just set too high. After a dissapointing Healthy Distrust album I was ready for Sage to come back and reel me into his world again. It is hard to be critical about something that someone obviously put his heart into but i was unable to find myself being "caught" by this album like i have been with so much of his past work. While it is definatly leaps and bounds above A Healthy Distrust, this album is no where near as good as Personal Journals or any of his ..Sick albums

Sage Francis is another one of those rappers that mainstream heads probably have never heard of because he doesn't rap about his bling or how many women he bangs. Because of that, however, it might be easy for underground heads to automatically call his albums instant classics. Fortunately, his latest album Human the Death Dance actually IS close to being one.

After the mini-intro comes "Underground for Dummies", where Sage assesses how his race could be a double-edged sword in the hip-hop community. Now, that kind of subject matter usually seems passé, but he gives it an interesting twist. And from there you'll find notables like "Clickety Clack" (no, it's not about guns), "Waterline", the introspective "Hoofprints in the Sand", and my favorite, "Keep Moving". And "Going Back to Rehab" is an interesting story, although "that's one hell of a God" is a very bad choice of words.

Sage is also good when it comes to freestyling (albeit with music in the background), as evidenced by "High Step". And songstress Jolie Holland helps him out on another pair of winners, "Black Out on White Night" and "Got Up This Morning". This album might be called Human the Death Dance, but what it'll REALLY do is bring you to life. Cop it.

Anthony Rupert

Sage Francis is once again coming with flare and raw talents over a well produced sound blanket of well drummed,stringed and everything in between. Get it, listen to it, make up your mind and pick up the Sage as his stories and poems of life's uncertainties and most definites add up to a great thinking man's music as a whole. Keep your ears out ladies and gents... Listen in...

Really the best way to put it, I don't where these people are getting the idea that Sage is a white snob. Thats so far from true, I saw him at the Middle East and met him along with Prolific, he gave me daps and thanked me for comin out. We talked about the label for a bit, very humble guy.
Anyway, this album is great from start to finish. He takes stabs at the mainstream, speaks abstract poetry, on "Keep Moving" tells an excellent story about a nasty divorce, "Hell of a Year" has an amazing beat and the flow is just sick.
I'm lookin forward to hearing Waterline and Good Fashion and the upcoming Edward Norton film "Pride and Glory", every Ed Norton film is amazing so I expect no less, plus hearing Sage in the movie. It'll be sick.

This cd is a must have if you are into the mid-west scene, or underground period. Definitely one of Sage's best albums. If you don't believe me just give some of the samples a listen. Great beats and amazing lyrics just pick it up man.

In general I like this CD. I am an avid Sage fan and have been following his music for years. I really enjoyed some of the beats on this CD though I felt many did not reach their very possible apex. I like this one about as much as Healthy Distrust. His verbage is there as always, my favorite "Buried in a Faustian bargain bin." However none of the songs got to me as much as say, Hope or Make-Shift Patriot. I felt the potential for some of the songs on Human Death Dance to hit this pinnacle but they just fell a little short. The CD is definetly worth purchasing but if you do not have his older stuff I would start with that - Known Unsoldier, Personal Journals, and Hope are my favorites though there are others. In fact on Human Death Dance on the second song, last verse, Sage goes through his story using all the titles of his CD's in different and effective ways, very cool.

Sage Francis returns with a solid effort after the dissapointing "A Healthy Distrust", a follow-up to the independent classic "Personal Journals". His newest album, "Human the Death Dance" reflects the depressed, yet somehow uplifting poetic lyrics that we have come to expect from a Sage Francis project, but the production seems more consistent and catchy than former releases. I give the album 4 stars for being a very good, not great album that will no doubt be a hit with the emo-hip hop heads.