Happy 20th Anniversary to Del the Funky Homosapien’s fourth studio album Both Sides of the Brain, originally released April 11, 2000.
Both Sides of the Brain signified the beginning of the second phase of Teren “Del the Funky Homosapien” Jones’ career. As one of the pioneers of the Bay Area’s left-of-center hip-hop scene, he’d earned quite a following on the strength of two major label albums (1991’s I Wish My Brother George Was Here and 1993’s No Need for Alarm) and his third studio affair, the independently released Future Development (1997). After getting dropped by Elektra Records in the mid 1990s, he worked to show that he could move beyond major label trappings and present an authentic portrait of himself as an artist. Released 20 years ago, Both Sides of the Brain is an unequivocal success on each front.
About a quarter of a century ago, Hieroglyphics essentially invented the practice of rappers and groups connecting with their fans through the Internet. Their ability to forge a direct link to their followers is a huge reason why every member of the collective still has a presence in the current landscape. A key step was when the group established the Hieroglyphics Imperium label to distribute their own music directly to the people.
Hieroglyphics Imperium began largely as a cassette-only label specializing in unreleased material from the crew. Some of their initial releases included collections of demos from Hiero’s earliest days. Other releases included unreleased projects that the members of the collective had recorded during their stints on major labels. This included the aforementioned Future Development, which had been shelved by Elektra Records. In 1998, they released 3rd Eye Vision, a compilation featuring all of the remaining members of the group, to critical acclaim.
Hiero Imperium then started releasing new full albums by the collective’s individual components. The first of these was Both Sides of the Brain, Del’s fourth full album. Del had never been comfortable creating material that fit into the marketing scheme of what someone else wanted him to be. So Both Sides is about him revealing his talents as an artist, both in front of the mic and behind the boards. He holds down most of the 17-track, 74-minute album by himself, which means he has to keep things interesting.
Much of Hieroglyphics’ rep is based on their ample abilities delivering battle raps and mind-bending syllable-bending styles. So, Del spends a good portion of the album displaying that side of his lyrical brain. He goes into full rap overdrive on “Time Is Too Expensive,” Both Sides’ opening salvo. Del flexes his tongue-twisting flow and immaculate wordplay as he raps, “Monarch of metaphor, malevolent with settlements/ Maniacal when Hiero flow, unstoppable and chock full / Of funk. The freak, so fuck the foreplay / Del has been ordained to terrorize your brain.”
The album’s first single “Phony Phranchise” features similar verbal acuity. Other highlights in the same vein include “Press Rewind” and “Fake As Fuck,” both of which also stand out due to their sharp production (the former is produced by Hiero manager and sometimes DJ, Domino). The East Indian-flavored “Style Police” features Del handing out citations for wack rhymes and dropping references to former St. Louis Cardinals third-baseman Fernando Tatis.
“Jaw Gymnastics” is the best of Both Sides’ rhyme exercises, an all-out lyrical brawl where Del is joined by Casual, who also produces the song. The rugged track showcases the two at the peak of their abilities, with Del getting “loony with language” and Casual boasting that “my beat kicks got blood on a steel toe.” Casual is firmly in the zone with his verse, rapping, “Liquid spills covering nine states, lifting crime rates / Shifting earth plates, Casual amongst the ranks of greats.” At the time, the two spoke about recording a team-up album as the Smash Bros., but nothing was ever released.
“If You Must,” the album’s second single, is an ode to the importance of good hygiene. Del’s quirky humor is center stage here, as he mocks an individual for having a coat with “the stench of crustaceans or bathrooms in a bus station” and ordering another to wash your mothafucking body ’fore your sweatshirt melt.” Of course, in our new post-COVID-19 reality, commanding someone to “wash your ass” has entirely different connotations, but overall it’s the best song about foul personal habits since Biz Markie’s “The Dragon.”
“Pet Peeves” is one of the weirdest inclusions on the album, mostly due to its length. A three-part, seven-minute-plus track about the various types of fake people seems a bit like overkill, but each of its individual components are well-executed. The bitterness present in Del’s voice as he lambasts “fair-weather associates,” sycophants, and phony gangstas is hard not to feel.
Del also includes a three-song stretch dealing with drug and alcohol use. The first and strongest is “BM’s,” Del’s autobiographical tale of getting off of a yearlong probation and then rediscovering his love of marijuana (a.k.a. “Bob Marley’s” of the song’s title) during a subsequent tour of Europe. He regales the listeners with tales of getting stoned in places like Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and Christiana (Denmark). The song strikes a note that goes beyond just his pursuit of getting stoned, having a more contemplative edge.
“Skull and Crossbones” is a surprisingly serious-minded entry, as Del warns about the dangers of drinking and driving. It plays like the PSA-styled tracks of the late ’80s and early ’90s, specifically a far superior version of EPMD’s “You Had Too Much To Drink.” Del uses an extreme amount of detail as he gives a first-person account of his own fiery death via intoxicated negligence.
Del goes back to using his eccentric sense of humor on “Soopa Feen,” a funk-drenched track in which he mocks a drug addict convinced that he’s a superhero. He spins tales of the nominal fiend and his trusty sidekick Faultor, and a mission from Commissioner Basepipe. Rocking his undergarments and Garfield and Odie beach towel as a cape, he scours the Oakland streets for crack, “sticking his tongue at the females” whenever possible.
Del occasionally uses producers outside of the Hiero crew on Both Sides. First is “The Offspring,” produced by and featuring a guest verse from El-P. These were the days when Company Flow was still an active entity, and Del working with El-P suggested a dream combination. The result isn’t quite as dope as it should be. Del’s verse and El-P’s abrasive beat each work individually, but both don’t quite mesh together.
“Signature Slogans,” Del’s collaboration with Prince Paul, works much better. The two had worked together on the Handsome Boy Modeling School project the year before, and this song is a natural extension of that chemistry. Del delivers one of his best lyrical performance on the album over a steady piano refrain, rapping, “Face the music, embrace the true sense / Of pain, when I stomp your brain and leave shoe prints / If you hot, then I’m the coolant / I rule with ironclad mandibles, they trap you in a pencil.”
“Proto Culture,” a celebration of video game culture, is another of the album’s strongest songs. It features both Del and Khaos Unique aka K.U. (who produced the track) going deep into video game lore, working in references to obscure console games like Gex, Last Blade, and Psychic Force, as well as controversial game developer Bernie Stolar. It’s an over-four-minute bonanza of esoteric video game lore, as they rhyme over a slowed-down loop taken from the Darkstalkers game.
Both Sides ends with “Stay on Your Toes,” where Del teams with Souls of Mischief’s A-Plus to comment on how fans perceived the state of hip-hop at the time. Del rejects both rappers who are obsessed with material wealth and fans who complain that hip-hop was better in the ’80s, noting, “I say everything's everything; nothing stays the same / And yet, it is the same, just given a different name.” Meanwhile, A-Plus expresses disgust towards rappers and fans who proclaim that “real hip-hop is dying.” “I be trying' to build with the close-minded,” he muses. “But they so blinded I get upset and they get clothes-lined.”
Both Sides would be the first of two albums that Del was a prominent part of in 2000. The other was Deltron 3030, a collaboration concept album between him and Dan the Automator, where Del played the role of a futuristic cyborg b-boy. Between the two albums, fans got a full look at the breadth and depth of Del’s abilities as artist, as an emcee and a producer. It would be another eight years before he released another album, The Eleventh Hour, on El-P’s Def Jux imprint.
With Both Sides of the Brain, Del established that he could transfer to his second act as an independent artist seamlessly. He could give his core fans what they wanted with his dazzling feats of rap dexterity, while demonstrating his vast array of talents in other areas. Whether it was flexing jaw gymnastics or relating the adventures of a crack-head superhero, Del had his creative juices flowing, and showed why he was destined to remain a hip-hop institution for years to come.
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