Comments:

Nightmares on Wax (NOW) certainly offers an oxymoron of euphony with its newest album Mind Elevation, which raises one’s consciousness by calming one’s soul. Mind eye, Mind ya, is track one in this mellow march to nowhere. I must of heard this album a dozen times before getting down to writing this review, for it was hard to grab one to any single element that either pulled me in or threw me out. I felt like I was sent to Switzerland, or at least ostracized to the outskirts of a land of equal neutrality, neutered, so that my desire went neither this way or that. The first four tracks were leisurely driven rides through a Felix the Cat feature, with funny automobiles that said “ouch” whenever there was fender bender.

The next track made up in beat for whatever lacked in fervor from the first four (tracks), but also bordered on ringing incessantly at a fever pitch. That the one set-back NOW has, all their songs were pretty much endless horizons of repetition, one set of solid beat repeated for minutes that at times felt like they would not end. That to me does not send a very good message to the listener.

It was agreed that track 5, Bleu my Mind, as the perfect saving grace in this case that came at just the right time, an instrumental rime made just for superheroes, to listen to, be inspired by, to dance to, to save losers by.

The second exception is a song entitled “70s 80s” which glides through with a drawn out reggae song abut someone growing up in the era. The diverse lyrics carry the song for the entire prolonged five minutes. It was only the second of two songs that I would not have to skip through.

Without the benefit of this reviewer’s experience to compare this album to, I would be inclined to allow this album slide by on the merit of this duo of songs. But you and I know that there are plenty of albums we’ve heard that are solid all the way through, and Mind Elevation does not tickle me as such.

Overall, it almost felt as if I had been subjected to an experiment in sound. Dreams are somewhat like experiments of the mind, and Mind Elevation was almost like having a bad one.

Favorite Song(s): Bleu My Mind