Dessa - A Badly Broken Code (2010) + Castor, The Twin (2011) [Re-Up]

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Dessa - A Badly Broken Code (2010) + Castor, The Twin (2011) [Re-Up]

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One of the most well-rounded members of the Minneapolis-based hip-hop collective Doomtree, rapper, singer, writer, and speaker Dessa (aka Dessa Darling, born Margret Wander) first made a name for herself in the world of poetry slams. Later, she formed the group Medida, which introduced her to the musical scene that made her a critical and popular darling of the Twin Cities. Developing her skills as a writer and artist as both an undergrad and master's student at the University of Minnesota (she would eventually earn both a B.A. and an M.A. in philosophy), Dessa took her passion for spoken word poetry out into the Minneapolis scene, eventually meeting people (MC Yoni in particular) who would lead her to direct interaction, and eventual membership in, the Doomtree collective. Once she established her skills as an MC in the group, Dessa released a solo EP, False Hopes, in 2005. Widely acclaimed by the local press, the EP made a number of year-end critic lists, and established her as the rising star within Doomtree.

Over the next few years, Dessa focused on giving back to Doomtree, appearing on countless solo works as well as the collective's group albums. In 2009, she became the first of the bunch to release a book of her written work, entitled Spiral Bound. This upward movement only increased as 2010 saw the national release of her first solo full-length, A Badly Broken Code. The album, having already created a buzz before its release, won an avalanche of critical acclaim and was a brisk seller in her hometown. The rest of 2010 would find Dessa embarking on a 40-city tour with P.O.S. (also of Doomtree) to support the record. She has appeared at a number of local literary events in the Twin Cities, and worked with the all-female a cappella group the Boy Sopranos. In 2013, she issued Parts of Speech, which peaked within the Top 100 on the Billboard 200. A remix EP, Parts of Speech, Re-Edited, was issued the following year. In 2016, she contributed the song "Congratulations" to the chart-topping The Hamilton Mixtape. She issued her fourth LP, Chime, in early 2018.

Biography by Chris True, Allmusic.com

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Dessa - A Badly Broken Code (2010) + Castor, The Twin (2011) [Re-Up]

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Dessa - A Badly Broken Code (2010) + Castor, The Twin (2011) [Re-Up]

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Boy, will the keep-it-real claque do their best to ignore this dame, who got her B.A. in philosophy from Minnesota at 20 and now, at 28, has the effrontery to teach Language of Rap and Spoken Word in a degree-level hip-hop program at a local music college. Not only does she refer glancingly to Dorothy Parker and Gabriel García Márquez, her idea of a boast is "Chicago Manual of Style/Keeps the prose right crisp." But that's how it be. Nobody owns hip-hop, and if some relationship-parsing white female hooks up with a beat-making crew where 40 years ago she would have taken guitar lessons, there's not a damn thing anybody can do about it. Dessa is so good at psychology–so clear and penetrating, so sharp-tongued and tender-hearted–she might have turned off the psych-spewing freak-folkers and nostalgic romantics of the former coffee-house circuit anyway. Love, friendship, anxiety, ambition–she addresses these things as if Nashville wasn't the last bastion of realism in the musical universe. Imagery–she's got it, right crisp sometimes, though she's partial to flying and sky. She can even sing her own hooks. Sans Auto-Tune. A-

Review by Robert Christgau

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Dessa - A Badly Broken Code (2010) + Castor, The Twin (2011) [Re-Up]

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I can’t work out why Minneapolis-based hip-hop collective Doomtree, of which Dessa is the only female member, are so under-recognised. The smattering of critical attention they’ve received has been highly appreciative, but they remain very much a “cult” group of musicians, with a small but devoted following. Between them they’ve been making some of the most finely-crafted, intellectual hip-hop of the last five years.

I know a few people who like the idea of hip-hop, but can’t stand hip-hop culture, and Dessa (along with Gil-Scott Heron, Saul Williams and certain Anticon-affilated rappers) is the sort of person I’d recommend to those people; she takes the idea of spoken-word delivery to music and uses it as a platform for social commentary and truly emotional songcraft. She’s also very focused on the melodic textures of her work, shifting between singing and rapping in most songs, with a delicacy often absent in the genre.

Castor, The Twin is a cross between a remix album, a live album, and a retrospective, as Dessa rehashes the songs from her previous releases (and one forthcoming song, The Beekeeper) with more organic arrangements. There are some really original ideas going on here; it’s a sort of “chamber hip-hop” record, replete with strings, vibraphone, guitars, mandolin, and timpani. The arrangements are innovative but not, as some exaggerations suggested, orchestral or overwhelming – all these instruments are used with restraint, with Dessa’s vocals very much taking centre stage.

In fact if anything I found the arrangements a bit lounge-y, not necessarily in a bad way, as it allows Dessa to fully inhabit her songs. While for some songs I think I prefer the original arrangements (Dixon’s Girl and Kites have some gorgeous samples, the essences of which aren’t quite captured live), many of them are improvements. For instance, the viola in The Chaconne becomes representative of its central character, the concert violist tragically devoted to his art. Alibi in particular benefits from the guttural upright bass and a menacing chorus – but still, an amazing moment is lost from the A Badly Broken Code version; after she raps “sometimes they say it’s the plain truth / 99 problems”, I expected her original exasperated “ugh!”, as she amazingly expresses disgust towards hip-hop sexism in a single grunt, but the expression is lost, and indeed, it’s indicative of some of the power lost from those originals.

The album’s title refers to the inseparable twins Castor and Pollux of Roman mythology: Castor was the mortal twin brother of immortal Pollux. Aside from the more human, performative feel of the record, it’s a reference to the songwriting styles on Castor. Dessa chose mostly her more biographical songs, (rather than her braggadocio side); she focuses on vulnerability. She can still show off – check out the range of her vocals on the incredibly quotable highlight Mineshaft, where she goes from the sung chorus to an almost conversational tone to a jaw-droppingly fast couple of lines and back again, in the space of a verse. But more often the songs are observational 2nd/3rd person explorations of characters, often shifting back into first person as Dessa puts herself into the positions she creates. She is a storyteller as well as a commentator on the situation, and blurs the lines between herself and her characters; at her finest it's remarkable to behold.

So while I’ve spent a while comparing these new arrangements to their counterparts, I happen to think that her records False Hopes and A Badly Broken Code were unreported works of genius from one of hip-hop’s most startlingly unique voices. If you’ve never heard Dessa, Castor, The Twin is a great place to see how much you were missing out on.

Review by Stephen Wragg, NORipcord.com