Here at groupbool, every thursday is tritone thursday where we pick three songs that share a common theme and write a short description about the overarching narrative.
We’re looking for more authors. If you have any suggestions or want to write a tritone for groupbool, please reach out to us at requests@groupbool.xyz
“I KNOW VIBRATIONS” in white text on an orange t-shirt. Someone make this and gift it to Laraaji next time he’s in town. When the man himself came to Creative Alliance, he navigated a gong like I’ve never felt before. Right hand melded with mallet, left with directional mic, he was the moon’s pull to that gong’s ocean. At this concert Laraaji encouraged spectators to cozy up by bringing blankets and pillows to the show, Tagarp schoolhouse style. continue…
We all know about the classic debate about book smarts and street smarts. Allow me to introduce a third contender: island smarts. But first, a quick digression: Ben Taylor has a great episode of his podcast Thinking Basketball where he talks about the tyranny of the quantifiable as it relates to the limitation of using analytics for basketball decision making. Tyranny of the quantifiable is the tendency for people to give preference to measurable factors in any given situation at the expense of perhaps more important, but difficult to quantify factors. continue…
You’ve been listening to a new song on repeat for a few days - singing it while doing dishes, while in the shower, and while driving to and from the gym. You’re in the car with your friends and someone plays the song. You serenade your friends, confidently belting the lyrics, only to be corrected and be told that the actual lyrics say something else. You feel a mixture of emotions - slight embarrassment, a bit of annoyance, and a tinge of pride telling you to defend your mishearing of the lyrics. continue…
Others came before them, but Ice-T, Eazy-E, and King Tee helped put Gangsta music in the consciousness of the mainstream. Previously, it was underground music, only for those in the know. Ice-T would amuse his friends with what were called Crip Rhymes, short raps detailing the life in the gang. These rhymes would later help form his hit “6 N’ The Mornin”. This song, along with Eazy’s “Boyz-N-The-Hood”, and Tee’s “Act A Fool”, painted a picture of excess, violence, and a certain hopelessness. continue…
Do you remember the Kia commercials with the hamsters? There’s something weirdly sticky about those commercials - they defy logic, and don’t make much sense in the context of selling the car but damn do they engrain the brand in your brain for years, decades at this point. This tritone’s songs were all featured in commercials that I saw years ago. None of the commercials really made sense, but I still can’t get the tune and the brand out of my brain after all these years. continue…
Alright, so I know we’re trying to be approachable and not pretentious here, but indulge me for a moment. In “The Shape of Jazz to Come” (1959, Atlantic), Ornette Coleman presents a nascent vision of the unburdened musicality which will become the revolutionary “free jazz” movement (although the producers added a self-imposed burden with that album title - quite a claim). Coleman’s vision is a musical system apart from traditional (read: Western) tonal centers and consonant harmonies where the musicians’ individuality and voice is put to the forefront to be compared and complimented by their fellow improvisors. continue…
With the worldwide jubilation at the exodus of the previous administration, I realized the unappetizing cheeto-dust colored skin of the twitter president has tainted the color orange for many of us. This very association of orange with racism and incompetency is what I am here today to begin to dismantle, by reminding us of the beauty and previous symbolism of orange through music: Larry June’s album Out the Trunk orbits two motifs: citrus and his car. continue…
Imagine immersing yourself in a 1940’s biopic and the main character listens to K-pop all throughout the movie - sounds ridiculous right? Period pieces rely heavily on the soundtrack for immersion. The sounds of a movie set the auditory backdrop and allow you to fully engross yourself in the time period. With that being said, when the music starkly clashes with the time period, I find my attention fully focused on the character and their actions. continue…
Despite the east coast provenance of the hip hop scene, the southern lab has established itself as the genre’s powerhouse multiple times over the hop hop timeline. More recently, the trap artists coming out of ATL have taken the world by storm and finally cemented rap as the mainstream sound. 1 Trap’s signature sound has found a wide following all over the world. It is creating a legacy that is uniquely its own withing the context of the artist’s circumstances and social context. continue…
As we turn the corner of yet another quarantine month, time feels more like a fantastical construct each day and my household grasps for any ways of distinguishing this month from the last 6. Consequentially, oc and I have been getting into the Halloween spirit more than we normally do (which was already a lot). Our home is decked out in orange and cobwebs and my playlist has been sprinkled with spooky rap. continue…
