“October Myst” by Adrian H. Molina w/ Mannequin Rituals, Up Before the Sunrise (2008)

This week marks the 9-year anniversary of the War in Afghanistan – the longest war in American history.  There is no end to this war nor the war in Iraq.  These are resource wars, wars of power and geopolitical/economic control. 

Many people have asked me what “October Myst” is about.  To this point, I have given very few people a straight answer.  The Mannequin Rituals, tracks 7-10 of “Up Before the Sunrise” particular, were partially about their mystery.  The poetics.  Theatrics.  The art of storytelling.  The art of unraveling truth.  Who dares to put forth the time or effort to know? 

Enough time has elapsed to shell out more clues and provide more insight.

This is the story of an American soldier who died in the Middle East.  These are the last 4 minutes and 58 seconds of his life, flashing before his eyes after he is shot in battle.  Listen to his story, rewind, start over.  And over.  And over.  And over…

These are his reflections.  His thoughts.  His love.  His lust.  His beauty.  His dreams.  His anger.  His battle scars.  His life.  His death.  His legacy? 

What did he die for???

The October Myst is the political haze Post-911.  The lies.  The agenda.  The deception. 

Bush’s war is now Obama’s war as President Eisenhower’s “Military Industrial Complex” plays out one president after the next. 

Beyond politics, this is a soldier’s story.  This is a dedication to all those worldwide who have lost their lives to deceit. 

This is for those who believe. 

Molina

“Sea of Glass” by Adrian H. Molina w/ Mannequin Rituals, Up Before the Sunrise (2008), CHiTT Productions

The human story is a puzzle, confusing, jagged and bloody, splattered about the concrete like a red sea of glass. 

Mannequin Rituals.  Stop the Police State, Save the Mannequins. 

The first piece of this journey is a dream.  An awakening from a long dream.  An agonizing journey.  A story of a scared man crawling out of the dark cave that is his history. 

The second piece is the realization of the chaos and destruction that has defined the human story.  An eye opens to the source of his madness.

The [spoken word] builds upon layers of deconstruction, making clear the patterns of misery that have plagued the human spirit and planet Earth. 

Murder, pillage, burn, rape
Jail, prison, punish, break
Lock, load, aim, squeeze
Freeze, strip down, knees
bent, kicked, cracked
Cut, gash, bust, blast
Judge, loath, hate, divide
Murder, mo murder, die

The last piece is the repudiation of this order.  The stand against it.  The revisualization of what is possible.  The pushback.  The path.  The passion. 

Meditation.  Reflection.  Action.

Manifestation.  The Age of Revision. 

Molina

“Skydreamer” by Adrian H. Molina w/ Mannequin Rituals featuring Helen Chanthongthip, Up Before the Sunrise, released by CHiTT Productions (2008)

Skydreamer is the opening track off Up Before the Sunrise, my first full-length album.  It was a dream.  I had been writing rhymes for 10 years, constantly envisioning what my first album might look like.  What would it sound like?  What would I say if I had one chance, one album, to say something to the world?

I started writing material for Up Before the Sunrise during the summer of 2006.  I had been through a lot during the years prior.  In 2005 I left the life I was living.  It was a life that wasn’t mine.  It was beating me down, slowly murdering me, and it probably would have killed me, mentally and spiritually, if not physically.  I faced my demons, handled my business, then tested out my wings.

After releasing an EP and touring my first play Phantom Discourse in 2007,  CHiTT Productions released Up Before the Sunrise in August of 2008.  I packed up what little I owned, put it in storage, and hit the road for some gigs with $1000 in my pocket.  It was with UBTS in hand that I met the Papers film crew, Aju, DJ Icewater, E.G. Bailey of Tru Ruts, Hakim Be in Albuquerque, and a host other artistic folks.  These relationships would lay the foundation for my work in 2009 and 2010. 

“Skydreamer” will resonate with everyone with big ideas, honest intentions and a brave heart.  I wrote the track during the fall of 2006 when I took a job doing research for a gang resistance and education program in Greeley, CO.  I watched daily as police officers scared the shit out of mostly brown and working class kids.  There were some decent moments, a few well-meaning officers, but most of these cops weren’t teaching those kids shit.  They were indoctrinating them with self-defeating ideas of obedience and complacency, setting them up to fail, basically telling them where they knew these kids were going to end up – in prison.  They were already constructing prisons in these kids’ heads. 

It was one of my last research days.  I stopped taking notes, flipped the page, and wrote “Skydreamer”, thinking about all the prisons in my head that I had busted out of in my own young life. 

Tomorrow marks the 2 year anniversary of Up Before the Sunrise.  This album doesn’t carry the classic Hip-Hop sound of Shine Flow EP and SOULAJU.  UBTS was much more on the experimental tip, no samples, straight out-the-basement musicianship by my DIY homies at CHiTT Productions. 

I love the concept of sampling.  Hip-Hop was built around the art of taking something old and giving it new context, new style.  We are constantly in the process of sampling various ideas and realities, sifting through the possibilities, throwing out what we don’t need, keeping what we do.  I embrace this.

I’m also down to try something new entirely. 

Molina

Independent, experimental, sucka free.

“Hunger Pains” by Adrian H. Molina w/ Mannequin Rituals, featuring Helen Chanthongthip, CHiTT Productions (2008)

Share 

Hunger Pains first appeared on Representin’ 4 Life EP back in 2007.   Representin’ 4 Life was all about flippin’ the script on empty mainstream rhetoric like “keep it real”, “represent”, “stay true”, etc.

I was hungry to put my stamp on the definition of “true Hip-Hop”, something I now feel is unnecessary.  There isn’t one "true” form of anything.

In any case that was my mentality at the time and I took an aggressive approach to reclaiming these phrases and making them meaningful.

There were seven tracks on my first EP: three songs and four acapella pieces.  Each track was about defining what I stand for and represent as a poet and emcee. 

The three songs on the EP were “Representin’ 4 Life”, “Hunger Pains” and “Young Brown Poet”.  All three were re-released on Up Before the Sunrise in 2008.

I’m taking it back to the beginning for weeks 10 and 11, reminiscing on my start in the professional music world.

I’ve improved my skills tremendously, as have my friends Dustin Neal and Will Ross of CHiTT Productions.  We’re all operating at higher frequencies than we were when we began working together in 2006, as we should be.

Elevation is something to celebrate, but so is the rawness of a moment, the beginning of a movement.   “Hunger Pains”, along with “Representin’ 4 Life” and “Young Brown Poet”, were like a manifesto.

“Hunger Pains” is like a fossil.  It transports me back to the days of my youth in Rawlins, WY.  It takes me back to the many moments I chose to follow my heart.  Propels me nostalgically back to CHiTT Productions’ makeshift studio sessions.

I’m constantly telling young people that you gotta push.  It doesn’t matter what your dream is, big things start with a vision.  Then you gotta grind and put your passion to the test.

Achieving success, on whatever level you define it, is going to make you sweat.  It’s going to make you bleed.  And you will doubt yourself many times.  But if you refuse to fail, your hunger and pain will manifest into something well worth your time and energy.

A.M. Soleil, Retrospectively is a 52-week blog series in 2010, reflecting on 5 years of music by Molina.

www.molinaspeaks.com

“Beyond Sundown” by Adrian H. Molina w/ Mannequin Rituals, featuring Day Acoli & Helen Changthongthip, CHiTT Productions (2008) 

Share 

Mass deception, coups d’etats left and right, shared confusion, no way to tell what’s real and what’s fake—a collective inability to ascertain truth from lies because the spin doctors are that good.

Polar ice caps melting, mass global poverty ignored, apocalyptic natural disasters, conspiracies linking what was once natural to what is now claimed to be man-made.  Seemingly no empirical way to make sense of it all, so the masses don’t even try.  They just wait for 2012.

Not that anybody is waiting.  People are awake, in all corners of the world, resisting global dominance by the few, pushing forward with HOPE—an elusive word in an Obama Era of Bush III politics and continued Reaganomics, or Neoliberal economics (as it is known in Latin America), or Neoconservative economics (as it is known in the U.S.), or “unfettered” free market capitalism or globalization, as it is known worldwide.   It’s all the same game: global dominance.

What I’m saying is that it really depends on where you’re at in your head, because this reality really is that schizophrenic.  One day it’s all love, and the next day it’s all fear, and it’s up to you to find the balance therein and stand strong.

“Beyond Sundown” it’s like waking up from a nightmare, over and over and over again, because The Unconceivable layers the air, brick upon brick.  At the end of the day, you look in the mirror and decide which side you’re on, knowing that the question will look and sound different the next day, and the next day after that, and so on and so forth.  But it’s all the same struggle.

Truth, freedom, justice, equality, some sliver of democracy.

And then there is the age-old question: “Would you die for it?”

Today’s question: Would you live for it?

- Molina

Respect to my people at CHiTT Productions, and to Day Acoli and Helen Changthongthip for their contributions to this track and the Up Before the Sunrise project.

Video by Dustin Neal, Mannequin Rituals

Download this MP3 – (Right Click)

As MLK Day 2010 comes to a close, I am reminded of my responsibility as an emcee.  I walk in many shoes and wear many hats.  I use my music to entertain, to educate, to inspire, to provoke thought, to create controversy.  These lines often intersect and sometimes they become blurry.  I don’t expect everyone to support everything I do.  At the end of the day, I am accountable first and foremost to myself.

“Kite Runner” is one of many stories of how I became an emcee.  Big things come in 2010.  Bigger stages, brighter lights, larger crowds, more opportunities to entertain.  I’m ready for these challenges.  I’m coming with more swagger and a bigger smile on my face.  But I gotta remember where I come from, what made me, and who I represent.

This week’s track is dedicated to Martin, Malcolm, Chavez, Gonzalez, Peltier, countless rebels unnamed, all my people who fight for what they believe in.  This track is for Haiti.  For the forgotten.  Dedicated to all the artists who push themselves to create relevant material.  This is for my folks at CHiTT Productions, for my son and all the kids, for my partner Aju, the homey Josh and my man DJ Icewater.  Thank you for your support.

Molina