By Deuce

Astounding. Amazing. Breath-sucking. These are just some of the superlatives that fail to do any true justice to the most recent album from Wabi Sabi, The Love Insane.

This group of seemingly countless musicians, vocalists, instrumentalists, you name it (seriously, just try counting them in the credits) can do whatever they want to sonically, artistically, sensually, and most of all, infallibly so, on this Long Player.

It’s hard to keep track of all the trajectories and feelings they go through on what’s only 11 cuts. But they do so without peer, to the shape, form, and contours of perfection as they please, with the gaping mouth—and incessantly bobbing head—of the listener as the only thing to guide them.

Just blaze through the titular cut, if you dare. They’ve taken it back to the golden era of doo wop on this one, or perhaps a decade or two later as the 50’s segued into the 60s, with a ballad in triplets, careening, coruscating electric guitars bending and pulling themselves all over the track, and the most sumptuous of melodies belted out by the lead singer.

The drums and the piano are moving in triples, the cut itself never gets above, maybe 70 BPM, and it’s the type of song you simply don’t hear anymore, and that, for anybody else, is damn near waaaay to hard to do.

Other times, the group goes far beyond modern. Let any man, woman, or child emcee get a dose of “I Am Okay”, with its mid-tempo, beating drum pattern, funk guitars you can smell way before you hear them, and a bass line just made for freestyling, and see how many bars get by them before they have to jump in, rhyming, ad-libbing, hitting flows, and doing everything else real rappers do without thinking.

No matter which cut you throw on, just know that you’ve got the real deal on here. The blaxploitation feel of “Manifest” is unabashedly, and rightfully so, as worthy as anything the worthy Isaac Hayes laid down. “The Truth”, another ballad, pairs the most heartfelt of pianos with vocals in the same vein.

Really, about the only question that needs to be asked is, how many songs can you listen to before coming to this reviewer’s conclusion: I’ve got to get this.