Moor Mother & Mental Jewelery - "Moor Mother X Mental Jewelry - Crimewave EP"

Alternative Rapper Moor Mother came to my attention earlier this year, mostly from that guest heavy Show Me The Body mixtape.  So of course, I went back and checked out her 2016 "Fetish Bones" album.  At first, I really wasn't sold on this album.  But Moor Mother's music seriously stuck with me.  I love the politically charged Semi-Spoken Word verses, which up against these industrial beats sounded like Saul Williams going through a trash compactor.  I ended up coming back to this album multiple times, enjoying it more and more every time, it's a seriously hypnotic album.  And then of course, like I said her presence on that Show Me The Body mixtape was seriously strong, notably her show stealing verse on that "In A Grave" track.  So that being said, I was really excited to hear this EP.  Let's talk about this!

This EP starts off with “Hardware”, and right off the bat this one hits HARD.  And I mean REALLY hard.  I love Moor Mother’s very dreary vocals that start off this track sort of slowly and eases us into the very dystopian sound.  Moor Mother has always had such a way with words, and here is certainly no different.  Her lyrics are always so brutal to listen to, they’re often bloody and visceral and even a little hard to listen to.  But Moor also has a way of bringing them into real world situations and making them really hit harder.  Up next we really ought to talk about this production.  This is seriously some left field stuff coming out of Mental Jewelry’s production, fans of Arca or FKA Twigs are going to latch on to this right away.  It’s seriously heavy, it’s quirky, but it doesn’t take anything away from Moor Mother’s verses.  Then we have her delivery, I love how grimy and raw she sound that always leads to these very show stealing performances.  It’s sort of dreamy and dreary and cloudy, but it hits just as hard.  All I can say about “Hardware”, is WOW.  Up next we have the much more experimental “Death Booming”.  It’s just as murky and twisted sounding, seriously some dark stuff here people.  But I don’t know, I was so much more into Moor’s more booming verses and as well as some heavier production.   Like, I certainly get what Moor is going for here, and if this was a full length album, I think this would seriously have come off much better.   I do like certain parts to this however, such as the very industrial and noisy production as well as Moor Mother’s very haunting vocals.  Outside of that, I’m not into this ones very dreary and sluggish tone.  However, the sheer noisiness of “Death Booming” certainly makes this one much more interesting.  “Matter of Time” is up next, and right off the bat we’re back to a so much more cramped and compressed production, fans of everything between noise artist and drone artists and maybe even Death Grips are going to love this.  Moor Mother sounds so much more animalistic and vicious on tracks like this that are more aggressive. The atmosphere on the tracks on this EP is seriously ridiculous to be honest, I mean I seriously can’t remember the last time I was this uneasy listening to an instrumental.  I can’t stress enough, fans of Arca will absolutely want to check this out.  There’s so much going on on “Matter of Time” that you may need to slow things down and pause things to take all of Moor’s verse in, but it’s certainly worth it.  It’s an exciting performance that’s quite frankly exhausting.  

Up next is “Streets Dept.’, and let me tell you, this atmosphere is absolutely hellish and seriously twisted.  This is what Moor Mother was going for on that earlier “Death Booming” track, but this comes off just so much more affective.  The atmosphere on this one is just as noisy and hard to place, but it works brilliantly.  Moor Mother’s performances are all so visceral and commanding, and often have her sounding like a damn near animal.  But I love it, it brings a serious sense of danger to this.  I love the very charges lyrics on “Streets Dept.”, the noisy drones that seem to be caving in on Moor Mother without a minute to spare, and everything else going on with this serious slow burner.  So far, this has been a seriously political EP, fans of Run The Jewels are seriously going to vibe on this.  This goes the same for “The City”.  The atmosphere of this continues to be very intense and visceral.  Moor Mother continues to come off so vicious, even among this very dream and seemingly upbeat atmosphere.  The production on this EP has been pretty freakin’ flawless so far, Mental Jewelry seriously did a number on this one.  And if that wasn’t enough, “The City” has easily some of the best one liners of the EP yet, especially Mother’s lines about “My end of the world speech be like…”.   So for a 22 minute long EP, so far this has felt pretty damn complete, and more importantly I feel like this is everything I wanted to heard on Moor Mother’s debut.  Moor Mother and Mental Jewelry end us off here with a real slow burner with “Big Crime”.  The very claustrophobic and disturbing sound of this EP doesn’t let up at all though.  Moor’s performance on this one is hypnotic, it’s not nearly as vicious or animated, but it still works out mostly because of the dreamier atmosphere on this one.  It’s a solid ending for the most part, even though it’s not the most shocking or defining thing here.  It certainly does continue with the same lyrical themes and vibe.  Plus the second half of this track has some of the thickest and coolest production on this entire EP. 

Rating : 7.9/10

Give A Listen To: "Hardware", "Matter Of Time", "Streets Dept", "The City"

Overall Thoughts:  Ok, so being a little underwhelmed with Moor Mother's full length debut album, this really is what I wanted to hear her.  This is a 22 minute long EP, but lets be honest, it feels complete enough to be a sort of mini album.  It's politically charged, exciting, noisy, and quite frankly exhausting.  But hell yea, it's a great EP.