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Review of "Three Day Weeknd"...

Press Amazing review of Three Day Weeknd, my project with producer/engineer & fellow co-host of Clock Radio Speakers Doc. Check out Jim Clifford & his blog "Words I Did Say"


“It’s rare that a movie leaves you pinned to your seat, wanting to see it again — right now, this minute — to work out the pieces of the puzzle.”

That’s a quote from Peter Travers that he said about M. Night Shyamalan’s “Unbreakable” and it’s a sentiment that I instantly thought of after my first listen to Columbus, Ohio rapper Armond’s latest EP “Three Day Weekend.” I ran through it once in the first hour of a six-hour ride home from my girl’s house after the holidays, and I played it back a minimum of eight times the rest of the drive. It’s simultaneously haunting, engrossing, confusing and compelling. And that’s playing it forward and backwards like the album cover suggests.

It practically unnecessary to talk about the individual tracks, titled after a respective 24-hour segment of the three day weekend. His bars and the beats truly marry to form one essence where you don’t think of one outside of the other. The Doc-produced ‘Friday’ beat glitters amidst a smoky sample, ‘Monday Morning’ exudes earthy vocals and ‘Sunday’s’ staying point is an electric wire of intensity of sound, in level not volume. You may be frustrated by that description because you have no mental picture of the sound, but that really isn’t the point of these 5 tracks. It’s not a project you’ll bump with your windows down in this warm January weather but it is no less addictive than the latest banger because it demands explanation and until/unless Armond gives one, the interpretation is up to you. Lyrically there is very little that stands out (aside from the accapella spiel at the end of ‘Saturday’) in the eyes of hip-hop’s punch line context. On this project, Armond exercises the often unnoticed skill of rapping cohesively line after line and never swaying from the topic of the track.

On the surface this 14-minute EP is…well it’s really not anything on the surface. But underneath it is many things. A cautionary tale against lust, an allegory of our relationship with sin or an examination of a deeply personal event. A project like this might get labeled ambitious except for the past few months that I’ve been digging into dudes catalog this is one of the least ambitious projects he’s got out, and that’s no diss to this collection. If I ever finish up my “best of ‘11” list you’ll hear more about this Ohio emcee, but until then you can get “Three Day Weekend” and the majority of everything else dude has out on his bandcamp. Don’t sleep.

armondwakeup.bandcamp.com