Citizen Cope: Citizen Cope : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

The mere fact that citizen Cope melds hip-hop with folk, soul and blues is not what makes his music resonate, although his unique spiritual hybrid reminds one of how jazz artists who absorbed rock raised eyebrows in the Sixties. Cope feels this combination deeply, and that's what steers this collection of narrative songs and streetwise sounds in the direction of the divine. Clarence Greenwood, a Washington, D.C.-raised singer-songwriter who uses Citizen Cope as a stage name, has more in common emotionally with John Lennon, Marvin Gaye and Randy Newman than with Macy Gray, Tricky and Beck, although Citizen Cope suggests all six, often simultaneously. His singsong vocal melodies can be lethargic, but his uncommon chords and harmonies combine delicate dissonance with unexpected flashes of beauty. When his prematurely haggard voice wraps around the hooks of his most substantial tunes, lived-in tracks such as "If There's Love" deliver hard-won optimism. Greenwood's nickname fits.

BARRY WALTERS
(RS 897 - June 6, 2002)