A LOVE LETTER TO LA
In a city where who you know and what your last name is seems to determine your success and social credibility, it’s rare to find an LA-based artist who wouldn’t try flaunting the fact that his father managed cultural icons like David Cassidy and Frank Zappa, or that his grandfather wrote screenplays for Jack Benny and Milton Berle. And it may never be noted in a promotional email blast or plastered on a web site that Mush Records signee Matt Alsberg, publicly known as Antimc, probably just finished having Sunday dinner with long time family friend Les McCann, again. But that’s just how he wants it.
“I kinda bought into that ‘paying dues’ mentality from the beginning. Instead of asking people for favors and hookups, I picked brains and tried to understand the craft of record making,” says Alsberg. “It was important to me that I pay my own dues; I didn’t want to ever feel like I was putting anything out before I had the ability to craft songs and produce records.”
From early on, Antimc has had an affinity for bands and artists within the Los Angeles scene. When it came time for his solo debut, It’s Free, but it’s Not Cheap, he chose to incorporate the musically rich history of LA, including it’s long-standing punk and rap scenes, to craft an album that spans his musical range and production skills.
The syncopated drum programming and sequencing mastery built early in his career as a producer for West Coast underground artists such as Of Mexican Descent and Log Cabin is apparent on the album’s three rap cuts: “True Believer,” “Bellies Full of Rain,” and “Canadian Dream” featuring Saafir, Busdriver and Cadence Weapon, respectively.
The album delicately weaves through moments of star gazing, atmospheric melodies and powerful progressive, hardcore angst as Antimc enlists Fog crooner Andrew Broder, Clue to Kalo svengali Mark Mitchell, and former Mean Reds frontman Anthony Anzalone for guest spots that genuinely display the producer’s growth from creating beats to crafting songs for each artist on the album.
“When I work with someone, I want to make a song that stands out in their catalog. I don’t want it to sound like a throwaway from that period of their career, or like something that sounds out of place in their body of work,” Alsberg states. “I want it to be a song that an artist and their audience feel is a definitive moment in that person’s career.”
PAUL CHANG