Capaciti & A-Scratch: The Blind Cinema Sessions

Capaciti & A-Scratch
The Blind Cinema Sessions
Fill in the Breaks

First, a warning: Capaciti is mad nasal. He's got this angry-hornet buzz of a voice that makes Cypress Hill's B-Real sound as smooth as Ice T, and he rhymes in a way that seems to demand that you just deal with it. Occasionally he dials it down a bit and you can hear something resembling a more familiar, conversational rap voice peek through, and that makes his flow even more bewildering. But at least you can't say that he sounds apathetic or complacent, and if you get accustomed to that voice, The Blind Cinema Sessions will eventually grow on you.

But then again, getting accustomed to it might dull the effect: Capaciti's voice is harrowing for a reason, and The Blind Cinema Sessions runs on a certain type of anxiety that wouldn't be quite as effective with a casual, collected flow. A concept album that centers on mental distress and the ways people react to and deal with it—tripping off medication ("Substance Control"), wandering aimlessly in a mental and physical sense ("As I Unravel"), quoting Nas while mulling over sleeplessness ("Cousin of Death")—the album benefits from Capaciti's and A-Scratch's mutual interest in gloomy intensity. The MC pulls it off with his relentless, nagging-subconscious delivery, while the producer augments it with crackly, minor-key, borderline goth-break eeriness; the result is a solid exhibit of what two dudes with some bad nerves and a breathless focus can do to make you feel comfortably uneasy. —Nate Patrin