I had no idea how to title this so, yo, there it is.

Okay, I promised myself that I'd promise you guys that I wouldn't ramble too much, but what are promises for, right? Just look at any Woody Allen movie ever made!

So this past Friday, Levi the Poet released his fourth studio LP called "Catarcacts." It has gloriously bloody album art and, well, take a look:

_{Just look at it!}

Initial Reactions

I talked every-zen-in-my-family-and-church's ears off about this thing when he first released this art and the first single, which was called "Big Business" and it featured Jgivens.

So here were my initial reactions:

1. To the Artwork

Ewww.

Why eye stuff??

Oh God, he's gonna cuss in this album and I'm going to get depressed.

2. To the Single

White boy tryna rap. (For future reference, it makes me uncomfortable when white folks try to rap, for social and auditory reasons.)

It's so angry.

With a little Cringes.

A Little Extra Context

I absolutely adore Levi the Poet and his work. I've seen him live twice, and both times he just amazes me, both as a performer and a person. He's so sweet, it makes dropping $30 for a t and a CD easy. Both times he served coffee, and his presence is just relaxing.

Levi the Poet (in my opinion) is a Christian artist. He does spoken word and, recently, performs over music. He talks about depression and pornography and suicide and cancer and gets crazy deep when he touches on theology. And it's all to a backdrop of "God is strange and complicated and sometimes awful, but I love Him and He's kept me intact, so I'm listening." All of that, of course, makes him a relatable artist to most anyone who listens to him, in one way or another. And, being a Christian, it's nice to hear (clean isn't the word) God-inspired music and art that's unique and doesn't spin on K-Love, though I bet Levi's bank account wouldn't mind some airtime. But that's not who he is. He isn't a sellout because not anyone can listen to him. He's rough, he shouts a bunch, and it's poetry. My mom, bless her, doesn't understand too much poetry.

Okay, Back to Reviewy-ness

I got the whole album Friday as a digital download after I emailed Levi back and forth because the CD pre-order copy wasn't supposed to come with a free download on the day of release, but because his website said so, he let me have it.

See? How cool.

First time I listened to it, it was on my phone, sitting in the kitchen. And I wasn't blown away. I instantly recognized The Fort Lauderdale Five as one of my favorites if I had to pick a song to stand on its own. But I wasn't very impressed, and I was thinking "Well, I was regretting not buying the vinyl, but now I don't."

But then I listened to it in my car.

Folks, buy this album and listen to it in your car with the bass cranked up.

It makes for a great driving album. It's short, so it lasts for most trips, and the balance is perfect in a car. Plus, you can force your passengers to listen to it!

(Mwahaha!) Now don't get me wrong, the album has flaws, and I (unfortunately) compared it to his back-catalogue of work and got a little puzzled, but I'll explain why with: (drum roll)

The Song-By-Song Revue (Yeah boi, spelled review like that because I'm an elitist, even though that's grammatically incorrect.)

Track One: Simul et Justus Peccator

This is a short, escalator of a song that intensifies until a pretty interesting climax which is ironic because, well, in my interpretation this song is comparing serving the modern church (or being a part of it) to oral sex.

Yep.

It starts with bits like "When I became the center of my gospel, I was tongue deep," and then moves through the verse with a metaphor of being between two legs, one being "tradition praising" and the other that "felt like power against my jawbone."

Pretty obvious, huh?

It's a bit of satire about how "we are the body of Christ" or "we are a part of the church body" or "we are the bride of Christ." In all three instances, there's this unspoken icky sexiness no one wants to talk about. But darnit, Levi went there. He says " Call it the bride and make sure she gives you headship." Ewww, right?

This explains the rising to a climax structure of the song because, well, we're working our butts off to make the church, ya know. Pleased. It's a smart yet angry stab at what the church has become. It has so many names and each one reveals its flaws in dutifully awful ways. You can keep "calling it" things, but it still remains broken.

Track Two: The Fort Lauderdale Five

As I mentioned before, this may be one of my favorites, musically and poetically. It has more of that bite and anger, but it's mellowed out by a treble-heavy beat and moany, bass synth voices.

The words discuss sexual abuse, primarily at the hands of "Good Christian men" who use the Bible as excuse to do whatever they please. He says "It was love at first threat," and he goes on to tell the story of a woman who suffered abuse in 1976, with no way to stand for herself or strength to speak out.

(Consumer notice: My interpretations could be deathly wrong and I apologize. I've only listened to this album four times.)

He goes on to mention how he has no room to talk and how he crushed his wife under "Biblical masculinity." We're all to blame. Christianity has made itself synonymous with "sexist bigotry" and Christian men like to treat women like it's the 1950s and that they should do house work and, as Levi painfully puts it, "submit." It's not just a problem in Christianity of course, but aren't we called to be messengers of peace, not purveyors of hate? I cringe when a Christian says they're not a feminist.

Track Three: Motion Made Visible Memories Arrested in Space

This is another shorter track with an undeniably cool beat that, well, feels its length. It's a little cloudy in meaning to me, but he starts with a metaphor about how his friend sees Levi's wall as splattered with black, when it's really white as snow, and his friend is horrified by the black specks that are, in fact, in his own view.

Oh snap.

That's what this review is. I'm viewing Levi's white walls through my own manic glass.

Crap.

No, really though, it's a song on perception and what is and isn't holy and how it's reallyconfused, but ultimately there is a good that evil can hide but it cannot deny.

He discusses being covered with post-it notes like fig leaves that, basically, hold his superficial knowledge and -isms that make him appear to be either closer to God or just, ya know, really smart. It's a covering to hide the naked parts, but isn't that what God made us from? Overall, I dig this track and it's open to a lot of interpretation.

Track Four: Big Business

Alright, this is the big, bad single that came out and that, well, I wasn't sure about. But this review is going under the premise of a good-ole car listening.

It screams "single" for sure. It has samples from a theologian(?) intercut between his verses and musical breaks that have neat beats and synthetic orchestral sounds. It's pretty clean, but then you listen to the words and it gets a little cringy, like the line "Each schism was a small price to pay for the mission, but I just couldn't convince the critics to listen. " Like A) Screw critics, and B) It just sounds like an angry and self defeating thing to say. And who are these critics you're trying to get to listen? Not me it looks like.

The strongest verse in here is "Of course it's all selfish ambition and vain conceit. Of course I want you to raise your hands and worship me. Of course

notoriety became the centerpiece as my pride continues to believe itself to be the praise of God." It sums up what he's trying to do, plus the master goes dead and it has this rising beat that gives you, like, anxiety. It's pretty legit.

He mentions "liturgy like a smoke screen," which is a common theme throughout this album. And then he talks about manipulating the divine like how "God became a literal trump card," which is, of course, an obvious political reference. And I don't know. It feels out of place with what he's good at discussing. Like, political music is great and I love me some hip hop and punk rock, but he's trying it on and I don't think it fits. It feels awkward.

It ends with a verse by Jgivens that is, duh, amazing. Plus the synthy voices that boom out a little choir section in the background really pull the ending of the song together.

Track Five: The Dark Night of the Soul

Poetically, this is a gorgeous piece. Musically, not so much.

Don't get me wrong, the music is not bad but it is so not on par with the words Levi speaks.

He mentioned in an email that a lot of the folks who got to listen to it early said this was their favorite, or that a lot of people dug it diggily (new word, called it). I kinda see why in some respects, and not in others. I had always assumed that the "older" LTP fans were into his older stuff, as old fans usually are, where it's just him and a microphone and him scream-singing poems. So it puzzled me that this one, with it's mild apex of emotion that feels often forced v.s. felt would appeal to them. But the lyrical essence is fantastic.

It's basically about faith and how, when you're younger, you have that mustard seed, mountain moving faith and God and life is beautiful, but then it all goes gray and happy things are seen through your educated, cynical lense, and it becomes harder to believe in God and to follow Him. But then it ends by reconciling the fact that God isn't as awful and unapproachable as He was when we were kids.

My absolute favorite line, maybe in the album, is "You let me lose my mind and I loved you for letting me hate you." I think this sums up what it's really like to be a Believer, and if you haven't experienced hatred for God or haven't cursed in prayer, you don't really know Him yet. He's an upsetting being to know, but He's also amazing and shakes everything you think is safe and comfortable. Levi is great about grasping this unshakable fact.

Track Six: As Far as the East is From the (Navel to the) West

This is the longest track on the album, clocking in around eight minutes, and it feels like it.

He did this poem on tour recently, but there was no music. There was no confusingly mundane chorus, mildly singing "God won't leave me alone." There was no upsetting, out of tune rising action to a, well, a well done climax (if I'm honest). It was just him, talking to a room full of people about how God and he had started to drift and what it's like to be on the fringes of belief and understanding and, well, heresy. He speaks almost as if he doesn't believe in God in the beginning, but he keeps coming back, in that same prodigal way it feels like we all do. It's a fantastic poem, and when we heard it live, my sister said "I hope he puts it on an album."

He mentions that he "Hope[s} Jesus is bigger than [his] heresy" which is ironic because he says, at the end, "God! Damn them, I still have You." It confirms faith and trust, but it is literally taking the Lord's name in vain in the traditional sense. When he spoke it live, there was a space between God and damn that was pretty obvious, but it's almost non-existent in this track and you hear "G-d damn." (Tried to censor it, Lawdy, I'm a baby.)

The music behind it is quite, umm, unnerving? You have synthy voices again, but these do these strange intervals that almost irritate the listener. And I think because of the music, this poem feels forever. Ironically, between it and the last track, it takes up half the album. Maybe a little over half.

Track Seven: Keep Forgiving

Throughout the album, he gives the listener this mantra: Keep Forgiving. Whether he's speaking to God or us, he's begging that we all just get along. Forgive each other. Cool stuff, simple, but cool. It all culminates in the last, seven minute track, that is wildly out of place on this record. I love it and it's good and honestly it's relieving because it's calm and the music in the background is acoustic-y and pleasant, but it doesn't match up with any of the sound from the rest of the album. You could say it's a bit of a relief from the dark, gory lyricism that shows religion as uncomfortable and living as violent, but it just doesn't function that way. It's like I turned "Cataracts" off and started listening to "Correspondence" (his third album).

I believe he performed this one live as an extension of the last, and it was good then too. I think the magic of that live performance is actually captured in this track. The premise is simple and he goes down a list of who to forgive, why, how it's hard and what it can do for us as people, how it can heal, and how we can end an album.

Final Thoughts

I know, this went on a while, but I really have a lot to say about most of his work. He invokes conversation and whether that's just because he's an amazing guy, a gifted writer, or a passionate performer, I don't know.

The main themes that were seen multiple times in the album were Keep Forgiving, and stuff about Smoke and Mirrors, talking primarily about how we pull tricks to make God look more real to people who need the faith. Sometimes it varies, but he mentions smoke machines and card tricks a few times and I thought it worth noting.

That's probably one of the coolest aspects of this work. It's cohesive (except, ironically, Keep Forgiving) and it gives it the feel of a concept album without actually being one.

It's pretty darn short. I like short albums, and seven songs makes for an interesting looking track list, but it feels almost like there's a half missing. Maybe the half that goes with Keep Forgiving or maybe just more things that could've been said about different subjects. But I do dig what is here and I think it was at least worth the wait (since Correspondence in 2014).

Score:

~

Thanks for reading! This is my first really in depth album review and I hope you enjoyed it!

Levi the Poet is an incredible artist. I'd be amiss to not throw some links at you, so here is his catalogue and you can get vinyl and CDs here. He's also on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter I think. You should follow him, he's pretty dopetastic!

Peace and love guys and God bless! <3