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It’s finally here! I got an advance copy of it yesterday and I had to sit on it for awhile and talk about it to a friend. I came away with a lot of thoughts:
First: I hipped my friend to Playdough & Heath literally like last week. I made a mixtape for her with a lot of different tracks that were mostly upbeat. So when she heard this she wasn’t as prepared for it. Mostly because she doesn’t usually listen to Wu Tang Clan or any gritty hip hop like that. But the mixtape served to provide several juxtapositions. Whenever I hip her to music, it’s either purely Christian/Gospel or purely secular. To have something that mixes the two was interesting to her. And it provided great discussion that shall lead me to the following soapbox:
You can’t really win for losing being a Christian. It’s as if when you’re a Christian you fall into one of these categories: completely isolated from the world and judgmental or so hypocritical that no one really knows you’re a Christian except for when you say it. I already know that I can’t share this mixtape with some of my friends because they’re going to be like “Wu Tang? That’s not holy.” or “That can’t edify your spirit” or whatever holy speak we like to use when sounding super spiritual. While I appreciate that view and certainly don’t knock it, it feels like we as super deep Christians can miss the point, or worse yet miss the opportunity to really learn something. I truly subscribe to the concept that you can’t just watch/listen to/participate in just anything. We can’t try to get so close to the world that we lose our Christian identity, but at the same time we can’t be so isolated that we become out of touch. It is ENTIRELY possible to be Christian and NOT BE A LAME!! You can speak about love and faith and hope, and still be cool. You can talk about video games and relationships, and other unimportant things and still have a heart for Christ. How do you find that balance? That’s entirely subjective, but it can be found.
Now with that being said, there really is something for everyone in this mixtape. The rhymes are as deft and discerning as ever. You can really sense how hard everyone worked on this mixtape. Every time you listen, you’ll get a different understanding of a lyric, or you’ll just hear something so outlandish that you can’t help but laugh out loud. While this mixtape won’t be for everyone, it is still pretty stellar. I couldn’t recommend this mixtape enough. So click on the link, download it, and donate. We need to support good music whenever we can so do it!
Throwaway note: I never realized what a wrestling fan Heath McNease was until this mixtape. I heard at least 2 Lex Luger mentions and a shout out to Randy Orton. As a big wrestling fan, that just made my heart happy.
Rating: 4.4/5
Tracks to Repeat: “#CougarSwag”, “C.R.E.A.M.”, “Sweet Love”, “Gravel Spit”, “27 Club”
Tracks to Skip: “You Know My Steez”, “Half Ghetto”
Travel with Me 