He’s the kind of guy who reads Ezra Pound the same way a bored housewife reads romance novels, and it’s time to give him a little shine.

I sat down with Rafeeq and had a great half-hour conversation. The tangents and digressions I’ll post another time, for now here’s what he’s got to say about his label Cleveland Tapes, other great talents in Cleveland and his new album PASTICHE (reviewed below).

Mentioned in the interview:

• Latoya Kent - Sweet Oil
• DeLoFi
• BLK TYGR
• New Surah Orchestar
• Cleveland Tapes videos

Album Review - PASTICHE

PASTICHE rattles and decays in ways reminiscent of abandoned warehouses along the lakefront of east Cleveland. The intimacy from the vinyl crackle samples paradoxically resounds in cavernous tones, the sound of a man shrunken inside his head, wrestling existential and holding a hostage dialogue with his musical ancestors (most blatant on the snarky “just you”).

The samples are chosen with an eclectic aesthetic simultaneously profound and tongue-in-cheek, further fulfilling the promise of the album title. leRoi da Moor isn’t making hip-hop so much as post-hop, perhaps a subconscious influence from Washington’s friend Efrim Menuck of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and the various incarnations of A Silver Mt. Zion.

What comes out of the wash is an amalgamation that, while not completely about Cleveland, has all of the flavor of our cultural patchwork city. What exceeds the stereotypical Cleveland apathy is leRoi’s self-awareness, literary chops and determination to wring as much as he can from whatever he’s got.

My favorite tracks are “boutique” and “cuyahoga”, but the entire work is best appreciated as the whole of its parts. Pick it up, and other Cleveland Tapes issue at Moor Musak.