The Numbs

Hip-hop crew to release new CD

  It’s hard to believe that one of the pioneering groups in Utah hip-hop hasn’t had an album out in nearly four years, but if you look at the careers of each member of The Numbs, it isn’t hard to figure out why.

Each member has kept busy with his own side projects, collaborations and solo releases since the release of The Numbs’ 2007 album Nfinity. Gunnar McKell mainly focused on his family, while Rooster worked as a graphic artist and started up River Apparel. Mark Dago released a 2010 solo effort, Self High Five, and he and DJ Shanty reunited with Rotten Musicians for their 2011 EP, aptly titled EPee.

But as any musician will tell you, sometimes it’s hard to shake that first love, and clearly love of the music is what brought The Numbs back to the studio for their latest LP, Soulburn. Even with all the other projects happening in the background, the group never officially broke up.

“I don’t see it as ‘reforming,’” Rooster says about the status of the band through the years. “Just a slow, constant process that has spanned about three years. We have never broken up or quit the hip-hop game.”

One of the biggest influences in bringing the group back to the studio was Ogden’s Linus Stubbs, who put together tracks with the group and added his own style to the production.

“Stubbs is one of Utah’s brightest and defining beatsmiths,” says Dago. “He captures that early ’90s aura—lush, varied beats that all manage to sound cohesive enough to fit together on the same album.”

The five started collaborating in mid-2010 and eventually booked time to record the album with producer extraordinaire Andy Patterson.

“AP is the best recording engineer in Utah, hands down,” Dago says. “He has such an ear for all kinds of music. The cool thing is that he can make your LP on a shoestring budget sound amazing!”

While it may be cliché to slap this phrase onto the album, it needs to be said that Soulburn isn’t your average hip-hop release. It feels like a tutorial on all things hip-hop and soul, kicking off with “The Return,” declaring The Numbs’ return to the game. “DNA,” with its fast-paced ’80s beat and quick rhymes, begs for a b-boy performance the moment it kicks in. “Won’t Soon Forget” taps into a ’70s vibe with cool horns and a simple jazz beat, which leads to “Way Of The Gun,” with its ’60s piano melody straight from the underground New York clubs of the era.

This album is a lesson in old-school music, beat and lyric structure, with each member of The Numbs holding class. 

Megadeth's Dave Mustaine

Listen to his lyrics, not his diatribes

“You take a mortal man/ and put him in control/ watch him become a god/ watch people’s heads a-roll.”  “Symphony of Destruction” is accompanied by a portentous, chugging rhythm that could soundtrack the marching of a fascist dictator’s jackbooted minions. The chorus line rams singer-guitarist Dave Mustaine’s point home: “Just like the Pied Piper/ led rats through the street/ we dance like marionettes/ swaying to the symphony … of destruction.”
Megadeth’s 13-album discography is littered with similar songs, where Mustaine laments puppet politicians, the military-industrial complex, censorship, poverty and the environment. Dude’s a liberal, right? Despite his reputation as an angry, outspoken red-headed stepchild? This guy, whose autobiography Rolling Stone called “remorseless,” and who was unceremoniously booted as Metallica’s first lead guitarist?
Yeah, it doesn’t fit. Especially ’cause Mustaine tends to say … things. Like, he doesn’t believe President Barack Obama was born in the United States and blamed the Aurora, Colo., shootings on him. He claimed to heal a fan’s cancer with his touch, supported Rick Santorum’s presidential bid and told African women to “put a plug in it” if they can’t support their children.
So, you get Mustaine on the phone. You strongly disagree with these reprehensible stances he’s taken in interviews and onstage. But in the backlash over his comments, Mustaine told Rolling Stone he’s “learned a valuable lesson” that he should measure his words and even keep his mouth shut. This is the guy on the line right now—calm, gracious, ostensibly cheerful and reasonable. He has family in Utah, he enjoys eating at La Caille, and allows that Mormons being Mormons “doesn’t mean that affects them as music fans.”
He seems like a nice guy. Still, you wonder. Is he shell-shocked from bad press? Is this damage-control Dave? Well, let’s split the difference and talk politics as it pertains to the music, like in “Symphony of Destruction,” and see where it leads.
The song, from the recently reissued Countdown to Extinction (Capitol), is more than two decades old, but increasingly relevant as America’s corporate-beholden two-party political system corrodes. Mustaine starts by telling a self-deprecating story about going for sushi after karate lessons—“trying to be Kwai Chang Caine, you know, a white guy trying to be Asian”—and being hit by his muse. He jotted down “my metal brain corrodes” and “my head explodes,” and, having just seen The Manchurian Candidate, “Symphony of Destruction” wrote itself. The relentlessly badass song became one of Megadeth’s biggest hits, “probably more so than ‘Peace Sells’ or ‘Holy Wars,’ ” its author says. “Seeing it stand the test of time and having people around the world sing [along]? It’s crazy.”
Even crazier is how someone can write this song—and others—warning of demagoguery and corruption, then take such a seemingly left (right) turn. People change, but this comes at such a serious political juncture. It’s frightening that such wisdom can suddenly go boi-i-ing. Could we give Mustaine the benefit of the doubt and accept that he’s simply spoken without thinking? Well, consider when he does measure his words. “Symphony of Destruction” resolves like this: “The Earth starts to rumble/ world powers fall/ a-warring for the heavens/ a peaceful man stands tall.”
Is that some hope-and-change crap? It came before Mustaine’s born-again conversion—hence his views on gay marriage, et al., so it’s not a Jesus reference. Except, of course, that’s how Mustaine sees it now: potential end-times prophecy. “That’s certainly how it looks like it’s turned out … not to be a zealot or a fanatic, but …”
Here he goes off, discussing the pace that technology advances in terms of everything from modems—he does a frighteningly accurate impression of a dial-up connection—to weapons. What he’s getting at is we’re gonna blow ourselves up. Nevermind why. That’s what he saw happening 20 years ago, and it’s true. There is wisdom in Megadeth’s music, no matter what garbage comes out of Mustaine’s mouth lately. So, perhaps we should just listen to the tunes and see where it leads.