Soul Glo deliver a bellicose record made for the times.
Soul Glo’s Pierce Jordan is a man with a lot to say, appropriately given the Philadelphian punk outfit’s designation as a band for whom consciousness is at the root of their aesthetic.
To illustrate, Pierce recently went on record as claiming: ‘Black people are the true culture and content curators of the entire world, but specifically Black people in America.’
It’s a take that’s provocative, but then recently a global superpower started a war partially because they saw diversity as a weakness. Maybe it’s time for society to have those conversations with each other in view of the retrograde, reactionary stem of politics which the establishment now hides in plain sight behind.
Diaspora Problems refers to the search at the meta level for a common understanding of black cultural markers, and draws upon many threads including hip-hop, metal, funk and hardcore that black artists have been pioneers of.
It’s an intense, breathless, staring-you-in-the-ears record and their first for the legendary Epitaph label, although still made on their terms; recorded in their own rehearsal space and produced largely by bassist GG Guera.
Sometimes intellectual weight can turn into a project’s entropic weakness, but from about a minute into opener ‘Gold Chain Punk (whogonbeatmyass?)’ the quartet’s controlled aggression and manic energy square words which, whether always audible or not, rip into their quarry, be they good guys, supposed good guys or bad guys; if you’re on that list, prepare to duck.
This could be hard time served alone, so wisely they’ve enlisted the help of a number of collaborators present in their Philadelphian orbit. Most of the extended family are rappers, with Mother Maryrose’s verse on the feedback soaked Driponomics making for as purer, dirty punk/hip-hop crossover as you’ll hear.
Soul Glo are not shouting at you though, even if it seems that way. Jordan, however, clearly believes in airing topics which are seldom raised in mainstream discourse. ‘Jump!! (Or Get Jumped!!!) ((by the future))’ is both an absolute kick ass punk rock tune whilst at the same time dealing with the spectre of careers often cut short or deliberately underexposed for black artists in their lifetimes, a phenomenon which posthumously sees the industry taking the financial benefit.
Often, as opposed to railing against both the liberal and illiberal forces in American society and the media, it’s the realisation that people most exploited by circumstances seem unable to help themselves which dominates this ideas maze.
Closer Spiritual Level Of Gang Shit begins in a literal funk, ruminating on what makes self-ghettoization such a compelling choice before gathering velocity like a centrifuge, rising to a brass section-led crescendo which is as fitting as it sounds out of place.
For many in this position, the enemy of your enemy (specifically the left) can also be just as much your enemy. Frustration with all words/no action boils over on We Wants Revenge, whilst the spectacularly grinding Fucked Up If True eviscerates the futility of a two-party system in which the practical differences between either are effectively meaningless on the ground.
Jordan, to his credit, seems to have remarkably little personal fear, speaking openly in the past regarding his struggles with depression and suicidal thoughts, a subject he again exposes like a rotten tooth on the broiling John J: ‘I’m talking from the time a nigga first tried to kill himself/Before any effort was made to understand my mental health.’
Diaspora Problems is angry, bleak and unconventional – plus it’s also a fucking great sounding racket, and subtracting one from the other would take away most of its power.
With it Soul Glo have made a record everybody needs to hear.