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For my fifth album review, I wanted to review an album I considered perfect front to back. So I went with Injury Reserve's send off album "By the Time I Get to Pheonix". Injury Reserve is an experimental hip-hop outfit composing of rappers Ritchie and Stepa Groggs (RIP) and producer Parker Corey. They released pretty remarkable and silly underground projects like "Live from the dentist office", "Floss" and their self titled debut album. The band was on a pretty good trajectory artistically and commercially until the death of member Groggs in 2020.
With this album released in 2021, the rest of the members decided it would be fitting to release it considering this album took a darker direction and most of the material was finished. In my opinion it's easily one of the most outlandish musical projects of the decade so far and one of the best albums of this decade.
"Outside" starts this album with a sample from a rap battle on top of spacy synths before Ritchie kind of responds to this rap battle segments, not in a way to lyrically destroy said sampled rapper but more to confront him. And in this part Ritchie's delivery is less of a rap verse than spoken word. Lyrically he seems to paint this picture of division, that could be within a relationship or globally as his vocals slowly dissolve into this pretty psychedelic progressive electronic segment that is one of the most transcendental moments on the album at the second half. An amazing start to this album.
Little anecdote : I discovered this album by listening to a snippet of "Superman that" and at first I thought it was pretentious and incomprehensible noise. In fact I was not a massive fan of this album at first listen but it kept growing on me in the span of a year.
So "Superman That" throws the listener at glitchy waves of percussions and guitars sampled from "Black Country, New Road", a band from the Windmill scene. It's honestly one of the most hard to grasp tracks on the album but also one of the most rewarding once you do grasp it. In this song Ritchie sings his ass off through the autotune repeating "You ain't no saving me or you". The way I interpret it is a failure within a relationship where Ritchie observes their partner trying to act on knowing it's too late, which could mean the title "Superman that" is pretty cynical and ironic. I think it's an uniquely beautiful and emotional moment for Injury Reserve, it's a lot reminiscing of something like "808s and heartbreak" with the autotune and raw emotion.
"SS San Francisco" calms things down a bit with a muddy bassline as Ritchie rambles about not wanting to face something and not being able to keep on as he doesn't feel like he's right where he's supposed to be. Underground rappers Zelooperz comes in with a stone cold verse ending with a line that's pretty evocative to me "Scared to have some kids because the world be goin’ through it". Ritchie retakes the lead with a pretty schizophrenic and daunting verse. Overall it's a very strange piece of hip-hop that reeks of exhaustion and desolation.
The explosive "Footwork in a Forest Fire" kicks off with a manic and killer verse of Groggs depicting a burning and anarchic world, love that ride/riot homonym play. The chaotic, ritualistic and industrial production backing this track fits perfectly Groggs and Ritchie rapping about things losing of their superficial value in the coming of an apocalypse. The way the track just fizzles out in the second half is some genius display of sound play.
One of the more lowkey tracks "Ground Zero" centers around the global pandemic of COVID with this ominous instrumental. It's one of the more abstract tracks where everything down to the vocal delivery and beat sounds so disjointed yet it translates pretty well the feeling of the world shutting down completely and the paranoia caused by the pandemic in audio form.
"Smoke don't clear" has Ritchie pretty cartoonishly complaining about smoke getting inside where he lives, which is fitting for the very smoky atmosphere of the last 2 tracks. The very glitchy production shining through this track despite its lack of melody is one of my favorites on the project. This track could metaphorically be a depiction about the raising problems of our world that never fade, where the band adopts a pretty cynical motto of "Do what you want to do".
The griefful "Top Picks for You" is my favorite moment lyrically on this album. Ritchie with one verse is able to abstractly convey how after a loss of someone loved, the algorithm of a social media still acts like if nothing happened, like they were still living, like they could come back to life. There's a commentary on if algorithms really depict who we are as complex beings, but to Ritchie he keeps holding on to that illusion as it draws him closer to that loved one lost. "I look across the table I see a lot more than what appears to be a shadow" opens the second verse that goes in a more metaphysical/philosophical talking about how patterns define someone after they're gone and that's honestly an interesting and existential reflection on our lives where he juxtaposes that to an Internet algorithm. Also it conveys so well that feeling of having to mourn someone while being constantly reminded of them because of the technologies we surround ourselves with. Overall it's a very meditative and mournful moment for the band after Groggs passing where they're constantly reminded of him thanks to algorithms but also leave the question of "what are our lives if not repeated patterns ?" on the table. Lots of words describing my interpretation of the lyrics but I haven't mentioned the beat, which is very vast and cold with those synths that seem to be crying, it fits absolutely wonderfully the themes of this song.
"Wild Wild West" sees Ritchie or Groggs (it's hard to identify who because of how distorted the vocals are) rambles about 5G towers before the instrumentation breaks into what could be the hardest moment on the album where the rappers throw cultural references to Willie Wonka, Silver Surfers and the Inspector Gadget among others on top of this super glitchy beat that moves into so many time signatures. It's a very weird moment lyrically that could be a commentary on absurd conspiracy theories comparing them to culturally impactful science fictions.
One of the more accessible songs "Postpostpartum" sees the band claiming their influence and impact with lyrics like "I was hurting from birthing n*****s". Ritchie complains about copycats getting bigger out of the style Injury Reserve has created and I quite honestly don't know who he could be referencing, but I haven't heard anything like "By The Time I Get to Pheonix" and this album is nearly 5 years old now, so they truly did something to crush their concurrence with this project. Overall with its moody instrumentation it offers one of the more confident moments on the album.
"Knees" is many people's favorite from this project, with the stuttering instrumental sampled from Black midi (another Windmill scene band), Ritchie and Groggs' vocals that blend one of a rapper, rnb singer and rock frontman and clear lyrical focus it's understandable why. Groggs offers a pretty introspective dive into his struggles with alcoholism after Ritchie speaks on his difficulty of renouncing his childhood for his adult life (hence the knees metaphor, he still feels the pain needed to grow as a being yet deems himself too immature to benefit from it). It's a pretty relatable thought for me, to face life's uphill battles but being unable to grow past the pain to really grow so you seek comfort in substance abuse. It's just a beautiful and poetic song, absolutely love everything about it, peak songwriting.
This album ends on a brighter note that what came before it on "Bye Storm" with it's somewhat triumphant guitar loop and lyrics centered on growing past the pain and keeping on living. The way I present it sounds corny but it's truly cathartic. Also love how Ritchie reflects on not only what he has been going through with the death of Groggs and his father withering but also what the world has been through with its natural disasters, to which the title sums up pretty wonderfully.
Overall, "By the time I get to Pheonix" is the dark, implacable and dense soundtrack of the 21th century. What Injury Reserve did on this album with what they were going through is nothing short of formidable. Not only is it a thoughtful abstract meditation of our digital age, death and the slow and frightening decaying of our civilization but it's also a genius display of avant-gardiste genre blending of hip-hop, electronic, industrial, glitch and rock. And again I could've dissected every bar and my personal interpretation of them because there's so much food for thought not only lyrically but also instrumentally as there's just nothing like it.
At first I didn't love it, and it's normal since it's such an outlandish album but it just kept growing more and more with me, especially how most of the tracks spoke to me emotionally and lyrically since it's really a representation of our times. There's also a very liminal feel to this album which at times reminds me of a more electronic "Soundtracks for the Blind". Enough walls of text, it's one of my favorite albums of all times and in my opinion a flawless LP.
I'm feeling a 10/10 on this.
Fav tracks : Outside, Superman That, SS San Francisco, Footwork in a Forest Fire, Smoke Don't Clear, Top Picks for You, Wild Wild West, Postpostpartum, Knees, Bye Storm
Least favorite track : Ground Zero (If I had to choose, I guess it's just the one I replay the less individually but it's still a pertinent and immersive take on the pandemic)
Genres : Experimental hip-hop, Abstract hip-hop, Glitch, Experimental, Sound Collage
Note : Listen to "My Ghosts Go Ghost" by By Storm (Parker and Ritchie's duo project following Groggs passing) that dropped this year, AOTY.
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