Customer Reviews

Welcome to My Dream (+2 bonus tracks & video)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

MC 900 Foot Jesus was (is?) Mark Griffin, a Texas musician who created some fascinating jazz-electronic fusion before basically disappearing in the mid-90's (creatively, not in a bassist-from-Iron-Butterfly-way). He was classically trained (played trumpet for a while in the Minnesota Symphony Orchestra,masters in music from...UT-Austin? Texas A&M? Sorry, can't recall) and it showed in all of his singles and albums.

His moniker was from an incident involving Oral Roberts, (keep your smart remarks to yourself) a Pentecostal minister who once had a vision of a 900 foot tall Jesus giving him encouragement over fundraising efforts to build a medical center when donors were hard to find.

He (the rapper, not Oral Roberts) did like to sample but always laid a nice beat around it, <SOAPBOX>unlike Poof Dummy who calls copy&pasting a Led Zeppelin song into an incomprehensible rap "inventing the remix."</SOAPBOX> This is the second of from what I can tell are three albums (along with a lot of singles and remixes).

This album is really hard to describe. More techno than jazz, more jazz than modern Chemical Brothers flavor of techno. Maybe if the Prodigy had been a jazz combo with a sample box or if Moby liked jazz a little more.

The album ranges from nice atmospheric numbers like "Falling Elevators" to dark raps like "While the City Sleeps" and "The Killer Inside Me" to interesting, funny, but not really categorizable stuff like "Adventures in Failure".

I had a tape of this album but wore it out with repeated playing. I see there's a new mastered version coming out today (serendipity?), I will buy it, hopefully they have not Jackassified the dark lyrics. It's perfect music for those rainy summer days of indeterminate purpose or long drives, something to be listened to over headphones while staring out the window (for those who have that luxury).

Five stars. Check it out.

I have to admit, my exposure to MC 900 FT Jesus was one of random chance. It was back in the day when most record stores didn't have a RAP section and the term HIP HOP had yet to become ubiquitous to the genre.

I was living in Boston and my friends and I would spend time browsing the RAP section at Tower records. Two of us picked up "Hell with the Lid Off". To this day, it still amazes me that the rap section is where this album ended up being classified.

This was also a time when true hip hop fans broke down and analyzed the beats, samples and lyrics. After the dissection was complete, my friends and I were all blown away at the complete uniqueness of the album. (I mean, really... who else was layering rough, killer hip hop beats under the incoherent ramblings of a mental patient?!)

I continued to follow the musical career of MC 900ft Jesus with the purchase of "Welcome to My Dream". The album begins with the Miles Davis influenced track "Falling Elevators". It's a song in which the lyrics are equally as haunting as the music. WARNING: Paranoid schizophrenics - avoid listening to this song for the first time while driving on the highway!

Next, the "Killer Inside Me" paints a vivid tail of a serial killer hunting his/her prey. The juxtaposition of this song right after, the spoken word, Elevators provides a great insight into the contrasting styles of this artist and made me wonder - was I listening to the music of a genius or a certifiable Lee Harvey Oswald-type?

My favorite track is the "City Sleeps". I recall living in NJ and listening to Howard Stern interview MC 900ft Jesus about this song, because it had generated a fair share of early 90's hysteria due to the story line of an arsonist on the prowl. The combination of rap, 808, jazz and the perfectly placed sample of "lit `em up like the 4th of July" create a song that sounds as fresh and creative today as it did the day this album dropped.

Right after this album came out, I had the pleasure of seeing MC 900ft Jesus live in NYC at the Limelight. Although unaccredited on subsequent album, DJ Zero performed with him. The show mixed live trumpet playing, rap and a liberal mix of a pre-Scott Wielend use of a bullhorn. It was a musical treat that culminated with DJ Zero's turntable-IZM skills of cutting up the Poor Righteous Teachers sample "...cause...cause I'm on top of this" as he literally climbed on top of the table as he cut the lyrics with his hands, elbows and knees.

I recently began dumping my CD collection to my IPOD and spent the better part of 20 minutes on the genre field attempting to place this album and MC 900 ft Jesus' others. Ultimately, I opted for "UNCLASSIFIABLE" - and that's a great thing.

I first heard of this guy on alternative radio stations back in 1989. I remember really liking it because it was pretty off the wall, and it was the kind of angry music that walked the tightrope between sincerity and irony way before the days where irony permeated nearly every facet of our lives. This guy was a little too ahead of his time, I think audiences of today would appreciate him.

He's got the vague angry-at-the world feeling of a Linkin Park or Eminem, beats that range from funky wah-wah to sinister electronic thumping, and funny storytelling in the form of absurdist rap. There are quite a few brilliant moments on the album, particularly the monologue on "Dali's Handgun."

All in all, this is a pretty fun and bizarre album that doesn't take itself too seriously, yet is still of great quality.

I have all my cd's split into 12 different categories, and I still fail to find the right spot for "Welcome To My Dream". Is this rap, jazz, spoken word electronica, or just "alternative"? Maybe that's what is appealing about it. Without a doubt what got me into this in 1992 was the track "Adventures In Failure", and it remains my favorite on the album. But I also really like "Falling Elevators" and "Hearing Voices In One's Head". There's also a track or two I always skip, hence the 3 stars. But if you do pick this up, be sure to play it while the "City Sleeps".

I'm glad I didn't review this album immediately -- I was disappointed by my first listen through, but when I listened again, I was intrigued, and when I listened AGAIN, I was hooked.

This is CD contains some amazing music, and it's an excellent addition to my music collection. "The City Sleeps" is fantastic,and while some of the other songs aren't so great, it's still worth listening to. Many times.

As with the other two MC900FT albums the first few tunes are amazing to say the least but falls short at the end. Mark Griffin has a wonderful way of telling stories in his songs and Adventures in Failure and The City Sleeps are two of his best. Tunes styles vary between industrial, hip hop and jazz. The industrial bits have dated yet still have an edge to them while the jazz/hip hop sounds are as fresh as ever. What ever happened to Mark Griffin?

This one won't dislodge itself from my brain. It's stuck there, and won't go away. My CD changer has 6 slots. 1-5 change daily, but the #6 slot is permanently occupied by Welcome to My Dream. Full of catchy hooks, killer samples (VERY heavy James Brown old school funk/soul influence), and a wry sense of humor that infects your subconcious when you don't THINK you are listening to the lyrics. People say, "oh this-and-that album by so-and-so is PERFECT driving music," or "this song is GREAT to have in the backround," or "damn, turn this track up bro... it rocks so damn hard", or "the lyrics are so good, I've listened to this album 10 times because every time I discover something new." But usually they don't say it about the SAME album. Except maybe this one.

I heard this cd about two years ago from a friend and I have been searching for it ever since. This cd has a few songs that will make you think, and a few that will make you laugh (ie adventures in failure). well worth the money, well worth more!

What a talented guy. Have his other work too. I can't really pick a fave of his but the songs Killer Inside Me and While the City Sleeps rock my world.

The music runs from acid jazz inflections to trip-hop to Last Poets type congas and poetry breakdowns a la Dali's Handgun from which I took my title. And for the most part this thing is funky and still fresh but it's the storytelling that really make this album for me. Sometimes, make that most times, MC 900 Ft. Jesus has his tongue firmly planted in his cheek but there's enough cleverness, creativity and just plain dark weirdness to make Welcome To My Dream warrant repeat listens. The Miles Davis samples, jazz cool and odd stories give this album a sense of cinematic atmosphere that's sometimes humorous, sometimes spooky and often a bit disturbing. Disturbing in that Jesus (Mark Griffin) is about removing the masks and looking at the juicy bits underneath his characters' facades. And his characters are, shall we say, a bit flawed.

Moving to the town like a ghost in the rain

A dim reflection in a dark window pane

Blackness beckons from every side

Creeping all around like an incoming tide

A broken window in an empty house

I slip inside and begin to douse

The whole place with the fuel that will feed the fire

And push back the night, taking me higher

On out of the darkness in a defeaning roar

The match in my hand is the key to the door

A simple turn of the wrist will suffice

To open a passage to paradise