Album Review: Bars Not Dead. Vol. 2: He’s On Fire! by Kai Ca$h
The Brooklyn rapper hands his firmest writing to verses with no hook underneath for a diaristic rap album that settles for a good line where a song should be.
A rap song with one verse and no hook is a gamble. Nothing reverts, no one else gets a turn, and whatever is written has to stay put for three minutes by itself. As a Brooklyn rapper/CYN cofounder who has been piecing together a spectrum of loosies, EPs, and features for years, Kai Ca$h takes that gamble more often than not. His dense lyricism of sonorous, inverted couplets seems to think its way through hook range. Line by line, he is among the city’s most quotable, and he keeps pausing at the line.
On “Make Them Pay. (Swap Out Edition)”—a three-day fast he undertook for his help, the strict sobriety he no longer sustains, and the boundaries he drew for his daughter all come together in the one verse. Harrison Gilbert re-used Drake’s “Make Them Pay” for the backdrop, and Kai Ca$h takes the space to reply to seemingly everyone who wants to know what the people he signed his albums to—“If you wonder he haven’t pushed a button on nothing”—are sending him back from Hampton on charters every week while he’s processing the trauma he went through. Now he’s got wine on the table “like I dined with Jesus,” after the likes of anxiety and is grateful to God that he never subscribed to the fear of missing out, describes himself as a natural Aquarius and makes plans to dedicate the year to his family. And breathes deep, feels his feelings and walks away while the verse still relates to the real him.
Kai Ca$h is back to mourning “the old me” in “I’m a Legend... on God!”, a one-verse song with no hook and no opportunity to catch your breath. “If I ever burnt a bridge, it’s ‘cause I’m good at swimming/But trust, I never burnt a bridge that was worth rebuilding” is a good joke about being unforgiving, and putting everything on ice the way he does when he plays for the Oilers is another. Then he makes a point to anyone, sounds like Hov, assures us he’s here forevermore, and tells us that placing a bet against the dog will get you time. A handful of those and he’s got nothing to be about except how confident he is. He becomes more specific on “Balenciaga Hockey Jersey.” He awakens and starts the day off by prayer, then introduces himself: “I got my knowledge of life from myself and not a teacher, then: “I heard the love start fading when you greater than you thought/I heard the hate get wilder when you make it past the porch/I pray for all my safety, stay secured and carry on.” Then he’s asking Scotty to beam him up and is announcing that none of this lets up, but instead it’s Hammer time.
Reuben Vincent, “brain fried to a frequency,” has “Too High.” at a pitch through five-percenter references and a broad he thinks has to be right to fix, then glides like butterflies off Muhammad Ali ropes and calls it a day in the top of his throat. Kai Ca$h’s other side on that song minces on stock parts, career highs are childish, hovers a hedge of protection from God, has an all-time high like he’s taking prescribed meds. Smoke DZA follows suit on “Parlay in Pari$.,” kicking “hood tragedies” on a plate and casting a shadow of who you give power to: “Don’t wait for ‘em to involve you/Give ‘em power to feed you, give ‘em power to starve you.” Lord Sko is appreciative on “You Know the Deal.” and mooching as they own it for him anyway: “Y’all can’t imagine the rooms I been in with no money/I’ve also stood up in ‘em rich when there was nobody.” SwaVay’s side on “Emo.” is previews before he ever saw any 8 Mile-ing, gang violence before it was cool to claim a gang, momma warning him off his hood—and Niko Brim, on the same song, counts hundreds and window-shops. None of those three toasts are together in the same room.
He keeps the grass trimmed in the hook of “Faithfully.” His essence resides in the bulk of the line, the focus on calling everyone past the lawn a snake, and having his girl at the window praying he gets home safely. In the verse, it’s the same thing, displaying a gardener by the work in the next, cuts the grass down, eyes the snakes, enters the garden, urges the flowers to thrive, plants seeds in the dirt, lets time snap the shot, realizes he probably should sell the building out and was meant to buy the estate. Ben Reilly resides on the same yard, observing loved ones getting disrespectfully aggressive towards him, then prayer: “Wrap your arms around my brothers, God protect us from the evils/Protect us from the need to carry protection.” Each voice is honing in on the same lawn.
There’s a nice sneer on “$how Me $um.” that’s aimed at anybody who would speak on his name “from the back of a bus,” and there’s a line comparing an all-white coupe to hauling slaves in it that has nothing under it but the rhyme. He lets a favorite singer “come and have a taste” and then sees her write an album about how he tasted, and that’s the funniest thing on the song. On “Picture Me Giving AF Who Don’t Like Me.,” he runs out of material entirely, “lit like PnB and them,” riding in something with a TV in it, then a sex boast with no invention in it whatsoever. He thanks his critics again on “Reputable Regime.,” a thought already worked over twice by then, and reaches for comparisons that don’t make it, motion infinite like buffet food, rap like The Matrix. “It took me time to be this great, not no hours or weeks/I’m talking years on top of years like sentencing” is the one keeper in there.
On “Winning,” he spits that he was sitting in the cheap seats not too long ago, and he remains that absolutely concrete figure straight throughout, from wild-caught salmon at Soho House to Nova Scotia to tan golden brown to time off with no posts and no engagement. The number Oprah earns is the number he’s all for. And then the watch: “Can’t tell the time on my wrist, wonder why these watches expensive/And I won’t bust down nothin’/I like the factory setting.” He buys it and leaves it straight stock.
Above Average (★★★☆☆)
Favorite Track(s): “Make Them Pay. (Swap Out Edition),” “Winning.,” “Faithfully.”