The Strokes think he's great, and he appeared in one of their videos. The Roots reckon he's up to the job of fronting one of their singles. Nelly Furtado, Macy Gray and Saul Williams all give him props. And, after three years, here's your chance to find out what it is about Cody ChesnuTT that's got them all talking.
A vast, multi-faceted jewel of an album, 'The Headphone Masterpiece' is one of this year's most beguiling and intriguing delights. Recorded in singer/ songwriter ChesnuTT's bedroom three years ago following the acrimonious demise of his band, The Crosswalk, the material cascading across these two CDs does its level best to take in every genre you've ever heard. Soul, pop, psychedelic rock, hip hop, blues, country, jazz - and that's just the first three tracks. Despite the daunting volume of songs assembled here - 39 tracks, 99 minutes - ChesnuTT strays into indulgence's realm only very infrequently.
If anyone was expecting this album at all, it would have been fans of The Roots. The Philadelphia band plugged the 32-year-old Atlanta native into the recording process for their 'Phrenology' LP. Those whose interest was sparked by The Roots' 'The Seed 2.0' won't be disappointed with this album, though they will be surprised.
Coming from an uncharted musical territory where Bob Dylan, Prince and Badly Drawn Boy meet, ChesnuTT's record is so lo-fi at times that it's nearer sub-fi. He flirts with disaster as vocals meander in and out of tune, lets tapes speed up and slow down as if the recorder needed fresh batteries, and gives the results titles like 'So Much Beauty In The Subconscious'.
While ChesnuTT is clearly not a strong editor when it comes to compiling albums, he can be brutal with the pause button on the actual songs. He works on ideas until he stops being interested in them. "Time, sweet time, ain't on our side," he explains on the two choruses of the drum-machine hip hop funk of 'Daylight', and then emphasises the point by halting the track abruptly after 48 seconds.
There are, admittedly, no singles here. Whenever a song is recorded to an easily broadcastable standard, it turns out ChesnuTT is either swearing like a trooper or talking dirty. ('The Seed' itself is a complex extended metaphor involving Cody having an affair with a new genre of music and impregnating it with rock'n'roll.) So 'The Headphone Masterpiece' will have to be absorbed in its entirety, or not at all. Our advice is to try the former.
