Boom Bip & Doseone
Circle

From a dissociated album can only come a de-ssociated review. A challenge with myself (and not only), an album that I appreciate but at the same time, when subjected to objective criteria, appears flat and poorly structured. Moreover, there is always that Dose-One-Two-Three in between. I must be objective!!

"Circle" (2000 @ Mush Records) sees the collaboration of our (my) hero with DJ/producer/composer Bryan Hollon aka Boom Bip, in what I would call an incomplete squaring of the "title". "Square", a track not present in the first version of the album but continually proposed in Live performances, seems to want to remedy but only adds confusion to confusion. A risky album, very out there both in terms of mind and ideas. Dose is still not enough "himself" and too tied instead to his Themselves, delivering a rap without rhyme and very close to spoken word. BoomBip lays out a carpet, not very colorful and vivid to be honest, but still intriguing, of instruments and samples.

It feels like getting lost in a jungle of voices and sounds where even the birds don’t know what they are singing, accompanied by an Amazonian tribe rented for the album. Dose talks only to himself, there is no other interlocutor in this vicious circle. The first two tracks, "The Birdcatcher" and "Dead Man's Teal", could merge together (Fu-Sio-Ne!!) and no one would notice. A crooked nursery rhyme ("Art Saved My Life - 71") announces the darkest moment of the album. "Question Over Coffee" is, in fact, a swirl of very dark keyboards alternated with an ironically toned spoken word. The ideas are there as in "Ironish" but then they get ruined, I don't know if by Dose or by Boom, or by both. The same structure is repeated too often: steady, dark, muted base and more rap. Skirting almost industrial territories with "Slight" resolves nothing even if the track is driven just right. There’s also room for electronic wanderings like "Town Crier's Walk" and "The Birdcatcher's Oath" among others that stand apart from the general blend presenting... nothing! Yes, nothing. A decent beat, addition, subtraction, subtraction, addition. The end. No, that's not okay, at this point I prefer "Rain By High Lantern" by Sketchie (perhaps a review sooner or later).

Yet the album is not to be discarded and I always listen to it with pleasure. But this time I can’t tell you why. Dose, in "The Birdcather's Return", tries to explain my state of mind and I don't feel alone anymore ("I can't get lost, I don't know where I am"). This is the only single from the album and perhaps the only track worth mentioning where the two guys feel the harmony and see the videophony (but always with a bit of scorn in the response). Unfortunately, the other tracks show no signs of life, and indeed they should be removed from the album to lighten it a bit. If you want to observe the (remarkable) progress from the beginnings to today of Dose One or lose yourself in Boom Bip's atmospheres, try this album. Otherwise, jump straight to more recent works by Dose (Subtle) and Boom Bip (My Space).

In short, for me, an immense effort. The next step is to review an album by a group that I potentially do not like. I accept proposals. I must be objective!!