Instinctive Drowning by Chris Orrick

"Red Pill's latest carries some of his best production yet" - Pitchfork

"Red Pill makes some emotionally brutal rap music. Guarantee you'll f*** with it." - XXL

"The cover photo is a picture of my great grandmother, Mabel. She, like my own mother, died young after years of struggling with her demons. This album is dedicated to my mother, Jody, and my great grandmother." - Red Pill

Consider yourself lucky if you can’t empathize with Red Pill. No one
channels bleakness better than the blue-collar Michigan MC, whose
sophomore solo LP for Mello Music Group, "Instinctive Drowning" plays out like the ghost of Bukowski on a snarling bender. His songs are lifelines for the doomed, death letters written for fatigued skeptics,
the anthems of an existence precariously balanced among a fifth of gin and a loaded .38 revolver aimed at the temple.

The album title doesn’t come from some glib “sad boy” gimmick—it’s an allusion to his unstinting depression and chronic alcoholism. The
saddest stories are usually the most honest and almost no one is more honest than Red Pill. His music is his own atheist confession booth. "Instinctive Drowning" unravels as a litany of fear and loathing:
rooted in the worry that his afflictions are genetic. Many others in his close family have suffered their own battles as well. Pill’s own mother passed at 45 from alcohol-related issues. If he ends up next, the album might as well serve as his requiem.

There is “The New Normal,” which chronicles his bout with viral
meningitis, a disease practically alien to those in their late 20s,
save for those whose livers are already ravaged. After two weeks of
vomiting and vows to quit drinking, Pill finally recovered and went to
the liquor store. “Club Privilege” is a club song for people who would
sooner kill themselves than go to the club. It doubles as examination
of white privilege, where Pill acknowledges the absurdity of his
self-pity, while starting brawls and screaming at bouncers.

There is “Fuck Your Ambition.” It is what it sounds like: a rejection
of white-picket fence ideals that never really existed. It lampoons
the Horatio Alger myths, the lies about self-sufficiency and the way
Capitalism has created a slovenly class of consumers. It could come
off as self-righteous, but Red Pill is never above the fray. He’s the
condemned marching alongside us, suffering for our sins, chewing on
stale pizza crust.

Virtuosic Ohio native, Ill Poetic, handled production. The co-owner of
San Diego’s Beat Box Records ceaselessly trawled his own bins,
sampling forgotten art-punk 45s to foreign psych-funk. From there, he
enlisted his Ohio band and a a wide range of musicians and
singers to add their seasoning. The music is equally comforting and
unsettling, eerie and familiar, offering the ideal contrast with
Pill’s lyrics—creating something with soulful depth but raw grit.

Of course, there is a paradox at the heart of this record. For an
album that courts death so closely, it manages to be oddly
life-affirming. Maybe Pill is an optimist after all. There is the
still the slight hope that he can escape, the notion that by writing
these songs he can somehow heal himself and help others. He still
probably will drown, but for now, few can float this well.

Chris Orrick is the patron saint of a poisoned world. The blue-collar MC writes spiteful chants for the permanently scarred, death letters for the forgotten, surly hymns for charcoal lungs. Think Bukowski on an eloquent bender, swapping wine for whiskey, a notepad for a glowing LED screen, the race track for the recording booth. These are anthems for the irate, over-educated and under-valued.

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