P.O.S., We Don’t Even Live Here
Featured Album
His fourth and best solo record
P.O.S.’s career has involved so many collaborations and side projects that, by now, even his solo records feel like collective efforts that tap into the resources of a trusted group. His status as a member of indie-rap braintrust Doomtree, slow-jam supergroup Gayngs and noise cabal Marijuana Deathsquads haven’t just provided him with different stylistic guises and cohorts to bounce ideas off – as you can hear on We Don’t Even Live Here, it’s given him an artistic community to fight for and represent. If there’s one thread that runs through We Don’t Even Live Here, his fourth and best solo record, it’s the idea that this kind of solidarity is a good excuse to get some real pushback.
There’s no shortage of the charismatic punk-rap firebrand talk that’s illuminated his work for years. But whether he’s trashing your flashy possessions (“Fuck Your Stuff”) or taking over entire city blocks (“Arrow to the Action/Fire in the Hole”), he does it on behalf of a “we” that draws in an implied “you.” Lines like “we can take all that pressure, ’cause we don’t want nothin’ at all/except for maybe some more of us” (“Lockpicks, Knives, Bricks and Bats”) are delivered with the kind of measured calculation that makes him sound like he’s plotting the best way to make you useful in his fight – or the quickest route to shove you out of the way if you aren’t. The subtle sonic shift from Never Better‘s moshpit to Live Here‘s dance floor clicks, too, thanks to producer/mixing engineer (and former high school classmate) Andrew Dawson, whose experience behind the boards on a grip of Kanye records rubs off on this record’s anthemic sheen while making sure to keep it grimy enough to cause a fire hazard.
