Album Review: ‘You Are Not Alone’ Kinetics & One Love
With puns that operate on many levels, along with sick beats, their lyrics will make you think twice. Kinetics and One Love’s You Are Not Alone is “a socially conscious concept album, reflecting upon the decisions of society as a whole and pondering the future direction of mankind” (http://www.kineticsandonelove.com/bio/index.html).
One of my favorite tracks, “You Could Save Us All,” notes humanity’s major crimes and its failure to give meaning to future generations. For instance, the lyric “we killed off an entire race efficiently and then we ‘observed’ them a single chapter in history” alludes to history books’ inattention to Native Americans. The song suggests that “whoever holds the throne, writes the official records. Why you think your knowledge of Nagasaki is just a single sentence?” Furthermore, the song makes “a toast to our downfall,” referring to issues that plague our society today from weapons of mass destruction to the increase in unnecessary distribution of prescription medications. Despite the many problems in our past, present, and future, this song encourages us to become a proponent for justice and human decency. It affirms that “you are not alone” and that “if you wanted to, you could save us all.”
“Sign Language” is a song that explores unrequited love, the deaf, and teen suicide. This song is about a lover’s inability to communicate his or her love for that special someone and the tragic events that ensue. The moral of this song is to not hold back your true feelings even if you “don’t have the nerve” and “can’t find the words.”
In addition to writing songs that are lyrically engaging, Kinetics and One Love also designed their album art cover with much thought. On the album cover is a timeline of human progression. It includes key events such as evolution, tool-making, and new technology. Following the building of the pyramids is, a “Planet Earth in the near future on the brink of destruction ultimately being saved by a computer called K-1L.” According to Kinetic’s verified account on rapgenius.com:
The imagery of that computer sending binary code backwards along the timeline to the present day (on the album cover, the code translates to “music”) represents a futuristic computer consciousness being sent to Earth in digital form, getting beamed into a present-day human and using music to uplift human morality. This song’s story of a human going back in time to help gorillas evolve into man through music is a metaphor for that image.
Check out Kinetics and One Love and their mission to “implant into the human moral fiber” a message of “community and cooperation” through “MUSIC, a form of persuasion with the potential to move millions of people.” This album is more than a hip-hop album. It consists of songs, each carefully crafted to convey an important message.
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