Most of the production on Qwel and Meaty Ogre’s latest, Freezer Burner. is incredible. Meaty Ogre channels T-Ray, Troubleneck, and Diamond, sometimes all at once (not possible? See “I Forgive Em”, where the drums are covered in decades of dust like T-Ray’s, the guitar loop twangs eerie like Diamond, and the synergy of whole thing is off-the-rails subway-car like “Back to the Hip Hop”). “Read Writer” sounds like a follow-up to Fugees’ “Cowboys” with its chiming low-end and dogged pacing, spaghetti-western blues guitar creeping up the end of every second bar. One of the reasons why people love Dilla is his matchmaker talent: he could find the perfect drums for the perfect sample, and the two would live happily ever after. Meaty Ogre’s working on this, and he’s close, except he doesn’t do it by clipping up Motown b-sides and letting lifted vocals ride for an entire verse. Ogre’s best work steals from stretched-out classic rock and psych, sometimes blues, sometimes railway funk, often stuff that’s already been strung-out through a distortion pedal, sounding drunk, perverse, woozy, punching and kicking through walls. It’s a dark, dirty, greasy, evil sound, which makes it all the more weird that Qwel actually preaches orthodox Christian diatribe over half of the record.

    That being said, most of the vocals on this record are also incredible. Qwel rattles his teeth over dejection, disillusion, and dogma. He writes like he’s on a vowel-budget and can only afford three different sounds per song. The one syllable that isn’t rhymed in one line will get recalled three lines later and litter the next eight bars. Examples: “We wallow in depression / stress to face the odds / that’s ’cause why we in this flesh we away from God � try to reason how the demons try to stray you off….” (“Cabin Fever”) or   “Teachers lying in your school / we’re taught to be monkeys…. Created in God’s image / not survival of the fittest / the effects that we witness / because we’re taught to be monkeys” (“Machinegun Monkey” aka “Kill Dawkins”) or “Future drama / futurama / shoot your mama / sue your father / want a tv show? / I know the truth your honour” (“High Tithe”). Qwel doesn’t need to betray his point at the cost of an elaborate rhyme scheme. His method and his message make equal impressions, and that’s a rare talent.

    However, when it comes down to it, most of the songwriting on this album is terrible. Qwel writes in bars, so his verses usually land both feet on the beat, but the dude does those verselong choruses that generally obliterate any catchiness or momentum that his writing builds from the start of a song. Think Cappadonna’s verse on “Winter Warz”, triple it, and then imagine how that would work if the producer and MC completely ignored each other. Sometimes the beat goes off into what might be a chorus, but no one tells Qwel. Either that or the beat’s wearing a “Charles Darwin Has a Point” t-shirt and Qwel’s all “Beat? Bitch, I’m not talking to you,” so he  keeps rapping and rapping until he hits his own chorus, at which point the beat is like “Fuck this, I’m not waiting for this windbag Creationist” and goes off into the second verse. That’s cool for a couple of flourishes (see Cappadonna’s verse on “Winter Warz”). It’s exhausting and annoying for 13 of 16 tracks on an album.

   Yeah, and sure there’s a God awful “dropping science” pun to be made here. But this writer doesn’t believe in puns.