Lava Bangers

by Lazerbeak, with Plain Ole Bill

It will come as no surprise to anyone who reads this blog that I am totally happy with yet another release from the geniuses at the Doomtree mansion in Minneapolis.  This time around, we are being gifted an instrumental album spotlighting the music of Lazerbeak, the premier producer of the Doomtree collective.

There are twenty tracks on Lava Bangers, which runs for exactly thirty-nine minutes. A few of them have appeared before, usually as intros or interludes on entries in the False Hopes series of mixtapes, but most are original to this project.

Lazerbeak is stretching his sound here - most of these instrumental tracks are not designed to be sung or rapped over, but instead exist as their own creation, and are quite lovely.  My favourite track on this album is the last one, 'Lift Every Voice', which I believe samples heavily from Philip Glass's soundtrack to the film Powaqqatsi, creating a transcendent and deeply beautiful piece of music.

Each track blends into the next, for which we can thank the scratches and blends of Plain Ole Bill.  Without doubt, it would have been nice to hear  a track where POS or Dessa could cut loose, but this is a project I'm very pleased with.