Previous Industries - Service Merchandise (2024) [Hi-Res]

For anyone who remembers how pervasive anti-corporate sentiment was amongst '90s subcultures, it seems kind of weird on the surface that the loss of countless massive retail chains of the era can provide the melancholic heart of an indie-rap record. But Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, and Still Rift, the long-gestating Los Angeles-via-Chicago braintrust of the Previous Industries posse, are playing at something deeper than just nostalgia for ghost malls. Service Merchandise is riddled with references to developmental-years entertainment and the consumerism that drove it, but it's not just the loss of the idea of buying things and surrounding oneself with stuff that they're lamenting. It's the idea of going out into the world and sorting through the countless offerings on display to find things that help transmit character-building experiences, like Wishbooks offering dozens of possible entertainments and hobbies ("Roebuck"), or the video games that introduce unexpected worlds ("Babbages"). And the ache comes from remembering what it feels like when limited income, scarce resources, and eventually the passage of time put that all out of reach. Service Merchandise opens with an homage to Digital Underground's "Humpty Dance" for a world where all the Burger King bathrooms are locked, and it's suffused throughout with the notion that even the most wistful moments have their own painful baggage attached. That conceptual thrust of the record isn't always upfront, and there's still a collective tendency for all three MCs to get their reflective, midlife-stock-taking message across through abstract free-association and cascading referential punchlines instead of trenchant Retvrn moaning. Their contrasting flows provide the further nuance—Still Rift's sharp-edged enunciation, Open Mike Eagle's contemplative melodicism, Video Dave's sardonic bemusement—even as it becomes clear that all three share a warped, sardonic kind of nostalgia that's not just "remember when things were better," but also "I have too many memories." And the committee production, featuring beats from Quelle Chris, Child Actor, and Smoke Bonito, is a warped and lo-fi collection of decaying-cassette unchillwave that pulls the unlikely feat of embodying the feeling of being exhausted by the weight of those memories without actually sounding exhausted. Nate Patrin

Tracklist:
1.01 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Showbiz (3:00)
1.02 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Pliers (3:02)
1.03 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Braids (2:15)
1.04 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Roebuck (3:16)
1.05 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Montgomery Ward (3:32)
1.06 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - White Hen (2:32)
1.07 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Babbages (2:56)
1.08 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Fotomat (3:55)
1.09 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Dominick's (4:13)
1.10 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Zayre (3:02)
1.11 - Previous Industries, Open Mike Eagle, Video Dave, STILL RIFT - Kay Bee (3:32)