Mystic - Cuts For Luck & Scars for Freedom

Titled ‘Cuts For Luck And Scars For Freedom,’ Oakland rapper Mystic’s debut album was originally issued by GoodVibe in 2001. In 2002, DreamWorks Records elected to re-release the disc, as ‘Cuts For Luck And Scars For Freedom … (Learning To Breathe),’ with five new songs: “Breathe (Better Days),” “Here We Are,” “Be Free,” “Ghetto Lullaby” and “No Competition.”

Combining soulful harmonizing and introspective lyricism, the album, says Mystic, is “based on a hip-hop foundation – though I didn’t really want to use samples – and then we added some lush sounds, trying to make it really musical,” and Mystic varies her delivery between rapping, singing, and spoken word.

By maintaining stylistic diversity Mystic avoids getting locked into one style, easily moving between repping the West Coast's virtues with Planet Asia on "W," to questioning hip-hop's image-consciousness on "The Gotta's," to the spoken word confessional “Spoken Peace,” to the battle-style rhymes of “No Competition.”

Contributing production on the newly recorded tracks are Kanye West (known for his work with Jay-Z, Scarface, Talib Kweli and Mos Def), Darren “Limitless” Henson and Keith “Keshon” Pelzer (Jill Scott, Floetry) and Supa Dave West (De La Soul, Meshell Ndegeocello). Tracks on the original release were produced by Shock G, The Angel, Spontaneous and Relative, A-Plus, CD, Manifest, Adam, Walter Liquor, The Dotrix, Chops and Amp Live.

Matt Parks (October 12, 2003)