Spearhead

20.04.03

Michael Franti and Spearhead came my way via a crappy copied cassette that had been copied off of another copied tape of Spearhead's first album, "Home". I hung on to that tape for years until the songs became fuzzy and static-y around the edges. Once I got a full-time job in high school, I hurried out to buy "Home," and I managed to pick up their second album, "Chocolate Supa Highway" just in time for me to constantly listen to it on my headphones when discovering my new college campus. The songs on "Chocolate Supa Highway" forever make me think of freedom, confusion, sunshine, and California rain.

Maybe that's fitting somehow. Franti, Spearhead's frontman, is himself a Bay Area resident, and Spearhead's music is full of powerful contradictions that make it revolutionary. Franti's deep, enticing voice turns rapping into more of a soothing bedtime story, even in some of the more "angry" songs on Spearhead's albums. This is more the type of rap music that you can listen to while watering your plants, taking a brisk yet relaxing stroll, or listening to the rain fall on your rooftop.

Franti has been respected since his early days with Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy, but it is perhaps with Spearhead that he really shines. Spearhead is a different type of rap: new, fresh, and bizarrely positive and uplifting. Their messages can range from views on the death penalty to homelessness to AIDS. Politically aware, and not afraid to show it, Spearhead makes the case for an appealing hip hop movement not based on "guns and alcohol" but instead on education and motivation.

This song is a remix of a track off of their 1994 debut album "Home" entitled "Hole in the Bucket." The original track is pretty kick ass, but as anybody can find it on any file-sharing program of choice, I thought it might be more interesting to provide this remix. I don't know where it comes from, but I have a pretty sizeable collection of "Hole in the Bucket" remixes (as it is probably their most successful song) and this one takes the cream. If you like it, buy the album. And then buy the second one and then the third. You won't be sorry.

Just dig it, and let me know what you think.

Download it here: download no longer available, contact me to find out how to get it.