By and large, we know what to expect from a Sage Francis album. Human the Death Dance, his second release on Epitaph, doesn’t stray from his familiar format and flow, mixing witty lyrics with introspective topics and social commentary.
The album’s production, however, is his most diverse to date and chronicles another step in Francis’ evolution. Most of the disc’s tunes are arranged in a pop format, but diverse instrumentation scattered throughout – fiddle, piano, trumpet, organ, harp, and cello – compliments the rhymes.
Alias, Sixtoo, Odd Nosdam and Ant all lend their talents in production, but Mark Isham (Crash, The Majestic, and The Cooler soundtracks) ends up arranging a few of the standout tracks on Human. “Water Line,” a two-minute tune of his, has beautifully swelling strings and harp.
On the other hand, the biggest knocks on Sage Francis’ newest full-length disc are the sequence of the tracks and the all-too-nostalgic lyrical content of songs like “Underground for Dummies.”
It also doesn’t help that Human… isn’t quite as much a call to arms as A Healthy Distrust, but Francis still manages to take on George W. Bush and the status quo in what may be the album’s best track, “Hoofprints in the Sand.” The album’s penultimate song discusses environmental racism with lines such as, “I find it interesting how certain epidemics spread / more specifically, where they don’t and who isn’t affected,” and makes a not-so-subtle reference to assassination with, “There’s been too much murder and not enough martyr / why is it no one else wants to impress Jodie Foster?”
It’s unfortunate that Francis saves his most urgent opuses, “Hoofprints” and “Going Back to Rehab,” for last, the latter of which pairs him with a live band. Human… ultimately does not achieve the MC’s full potential, but does present highly promising glimpses of what the future may hold. It will be interesting to see where Francis heads from here.
– Scott Morrow
Sage Francis (Epitaph Records)