Left Leberra – Bubble Quiet Dos Mil (2011) [Self-Released] // Grade: B+

In the interest of disclosure I’ve got a beat on here, so you know I’m already fuckin with Leberra. And you might remember him from a previous High Tide post. He’s someone that I said would be coming up on the bloglin again soon. And, low and behold here he comes with Bubble Quiet Dos Mil. And bubble quiet is what Left is doing. And while I’m sure it’s not easy, he makes it look easy. Leberra’s whole deal is just chill, and take it easy. And, when you’re in his position I’d imagine you gotta take it slow. If you got a lil zippy lil’ speed boat you can toot around all you want, but when you’re at the helm of something bigger (like Left’s role in the Areb crew) you move chill, and take it easy. On Left’s twitter he lists himself as GRAPHIC ARTIST/DIRECTOR/EDITOR/MUSICIAN and if you look at his blog you can see a lot of different work going on. As the Wave is gaining recognition folks are realizing that there is a whole other kind of rap music out there. There are people with pop sensibilities, living lives and making art that is very different from what our society expects of rappers.

Left fits into the category of disrupted expectations pretty nicely. He doesn’t have some sweeping empire helmed by the children of the moguls who gave him his empire. Left has the Areb crew, and they get it open like regular blue collar humans. Left has a skill and a passion when it comes to graphic arts, and his conception of the brand that his crew is creating. So, not only does Left rap, but he also carries a number of other duties. Basically he’s a well-rounded dude when it comes to the music. He doesn’t just do the raps when he wants to put out raps. He does a whole bunch of shit, and all the shit that he did this time around came out pret-ty pret-ty good.

The album is 12 tracks that maintain a very even chill pace, and while the vibe is constant the album definitely has an arc, or a few of them. It runs from introspective marinations, to mobbin’ with restraint. However you slice it though Bubble Quiet keeps your head nodding, and Leberra’s lyrics keep your mind sparked. He does like a rapper does, and weaves an ethereal narrative that describes his life without containing it. He creates a space for us to step into where we are free to take things with us, but Left himself won’t tell us what to take away. It’s actually a lot like Erik Satie’s Furniture Music. Don’t expect Left to hit you over the head with rap speak because the dude is too chill for such extensive artifice. Expect to sink into the ether and slowly piece together the fractured life summations he lays out until you’re in the midst of some pretty deep observations.

It’s reward raps for the type of listener who wants to get into a relationship with a record. Do you enjoy listening to a record multiple times before you really get a firm sense of what’s going on? Do you enjoy hearing something new in a record years after you began listening to it? That’s the kind of music that is on here, and the folks who made it happen did it with no budget from a record label. I highly recommend not letting this go under your radar as one of the more noble releases of 2011.

- Zachg