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Field Mob Album Review: LIGHT POLES AND PINE TREES

“Is it because we country that we’re easily underappreciated? But when we rap we STAB and conquer with Lethal statements…" - Shawn Jay, “It’s Over”.

The New South movement continues to grow stronger and stronger. A new South that still sports your traditional southern artists that depend more on their beats than lyrical talent like the popular crunk artists (Lil John, etc) but on the other side of the fence are your new Down South lyrical terrors following in the footsteps of the Southern pioneers like Outkast, 8Ball MJG, Ghetto Boys, Goodie Mob and Poison Clan. Today you have Ludacris, Lil Wayne, Da Backwudz, The Clipse, T.I., Slim Thug, Trick Daddy, David Banner and I-20 to name a few that are continuing the lyrical onslaught. Geographically these lyrical terrors are springing up everywhere from Texas, New Orleans, Alabama, to Virginia, North Carolina and all the way down to Atlanta, GA and Florida. Case in point is Field Mob hailing from the tiny tiny town of Albany GA. They appropriately entitled their third and newest album LIGHT POLES AND PINE TREES cause to quote Shawn Jay in his interview with the DTP media; “you look up and that’s what you see in Albany”. Field Mob consists of Smoke and Shawn Jay who both take their lyrics seriously. So seriously in fact that after two critically acclaimed albums they caught the eye of Ludacris who quickly accepted them into his DTP posse. The result was twice the public exposure as was witnessed by their smash single “GEORGIA” that got attention at first mainly to the catchy Ray Charles chorus and the Ludacris intro. But venture into more of the song and you would have noticed Smoke and Shawn ripping it up just as hard depicting picture perfect details of what growing up in Georgia is like. Another nice thing about the new South and hence Field Mob is that they in no way try to imitate no other region. They mix their lyrical ability with their own Southern culture and the result is a beautiful mix of lyrics and Southern bump and soul that is hard to rival. The West Coast blew up precisely for the same reason….Authenticity. I often find myself out of breath when I’m watching a music video featuring the authentic AND CONSTANTLY CHANGING dance steps and hiphop concepts of my African American community. I’m sorry but my culture is the S$$$!!!!! WE ARE ALWAYS IMITATED BUT NEVER DUPLICATED AND CONSTANTLY CREATING! Hence it’s the same with Southern hiphop and it’s the same with Field Mob who blend some old school lyrical sensibilities with that traditional southern bump and authenticity and touch it off with a smooth influx of soul.

Following the success of their smash hit “Georgia” (which is also on this album as a bonus), Field Mob comes through with another soulful hit called “So What” featuring Smoke’s cousin Ciara. This song even won Benz0 over though it is a bit more smoothed out than my usual tastes. This song is the perfect blend of bounce and smoothness though as Ciara blends in perfectly with the lyrical doings of Shawn and Smoke because Ciara’s chorus has her practically rapping it versus singing. With this album Field Mob actually gives us an overdose of other smoothed out soulful cuts that have just enough edge in them to not come off as commercial and lazy. “My Wheels” and “At The Park” in particular do great jobs of blending in soul with thumping beats. “At the Park” has sleeper hit written all over it. Smoothing out the rest of the album is “Smilin’” featuring Ludacris, “Eat Em Up, Beat Em Up”, “Pistol Grip”, “Sorry Baby” featuring label mate Bobby Valentino and “Blacker the Berry”. The latter is interesting as Smoke delves into the ugly subject of how black people actually discriminate amongst their own kind as dark-skinned blacks are routinely teased unmercifully growing up as being “light-skinned” was the beauty standard back in the day until the arrival of Big Daddy Kane, Wesley Snipes, Michael Jordan, Taye Diggs, Tyrese, etc. Even nowadays I have ignorant male and female friends that won’t talk to a person because the person is dark-skinned. STOP THE MADNESS MY PEOPLE!!. JESUS CHRIST! It’s the Twenty-First Century for goodness sakes!

Thankfully though Field Mob also gives hyper, hardcore folks like myself some nice stuff to get crazy to as well. The intro “1,2,3” is as hard as they come and it took a while for me to move on from that song as it hits you so hard. Other standouts are “It’s Over”, “Baby Bend Over”, and “Area Code 229”. “It’s Over” is a nice ode to those still hating on the South as the days of assuming southern artists are inferior are “OVER”! But the real jewel probably of this entire album is “I Hate You”. The anger of the song is directed at the all too often greed of the modern phenomenon known as “the baby’s mama”. The chorus has Field Mob screaming “I HATE YOU SO MUCH RIGHT NOW!!”. Yeah it’s kind of a remake of its R&B predecessor but the way they switch it up is genius. The best part of the song I think is how they have the satirical “You know I Love U Baby” weaving in and out between the lyrics. It doesn’t get any better than this song. Black people stand up and applaud yourselves!

This album is one of those rare albums in which some thought was put into EACH AND EVERY SONG. Whatever they are doing over there in DTP studios is pure genius cause this album was constructed to not only sell big due to the plethora of smoothed out gangsta cuts but to also appeal in the club circuit so that the radio, club, and street crowd are all pleased. And the album in NO WAY feels contrived and forced. Everything pours together smoothly. What I’ve noticed is that Southern artists have perfected the art of the smooth sound without sounding corny like the contrived R&B attempts of Non-Southern artists (50 Cent’s B.S. R&B songs come to mind here!!). So I say to one and ALL this album is a MUST HAVE. Scoop this album up. These guys are serious artists with some serious lyrics that force you to listen to every verse and if you listen closely enough they throw tons of old school tributes in their lyrics (They even have a Nice & Smooth imitation on here). The New South is here to stay!

Benz0
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