Image courtesy The Flavor Project
The Flavor Project’s “Food for Thought” is the summer pandemic mixtape you didn’t know you needed. Clocking in at a brisk 45 minutes, it has the format and feel of a classic vinyl LP. It even starts with the sound of a needle drop. And then the band kicks in, with a well-sequenced set of songs slipping through genres with quick-change arrangements likely to switch styles midsong.
The opener, “Bob Morales,” starts with rap overlaid on a bed of ominous horns, police sirens and breaking glass. That leads into the eight-minute romantic arc of “About It,” where headlong testosterone flow meets self-aware feminine resistance, crashes and recovers. The next track, “Food for Thought,” could have come from Curtis Mayfield’s “Superfly” soundtrack, a palate-cleansing instrumental built on an eight-bar beat. Romance goes off the tracks again with “Bad News” before making a soulful play for redemption with “I’ll Take My Mask Off for You,” featuring guest vocalist Eddie Prendergast.
The second half signals a less romantic focus with the brief, clunky and accurately named “Whole Tone Rap,” a cold blast of free jazz. “If You Touch Me” may be the most timely track on the record, a Sly Stone-style rave-up response to police violence punctuated with audio clips from a World War II documentary.
Things lighten up with the Brazilian-tinged “Samba Blues” followed by a Jamaican dub reprise of “Food for Thought.” The song cycle closes out with the optimistic, Stevie Wonder-esque anthem “That Weight,” about the liberation of accepting both the burdens and joys of adulthood.
Lead vocals are shared by soul powerhouse Buttafly Vazquez and rapper Armando Munoz, accompanied by band leader Gabriel Santamaria on bass, James Seretis on guitar, Larri Branch on keyboards, Josh McCormick on drums, Hector Barez on congas and an all-star RVA horn section led by Chris Sclafani.
