PRISM MEDIA
PRESENTING REALITY IN SLOW MOTION.
IT’S A MESS AT HOME
“Maybe my depression is a sentence for my egodeath.”
by Nicholas Torres
12/18/2020, 12:00PM
I spent some time in a small, rural town forty minutes north of Atlanta for about three years of my adolescence. My dad was promised a six-figure job selling life insurance so we uprooted our lives from Carol City, Florida and moved into my family’s first house two days before my tenth birthday. This was in Sept. 2007, roughly a year before the entire market crashed and we went into a severe global recession, the likes of which we had not seen since the Great Depression.
I remember that first winter being in Atlanta. My brother and I saw snow for the first time. We had only seen it in movies. In fact, it was the most snow Georgia had seen in nearly 15 years. I remember digging my hand in the snow and being... unimpressed with the way it looked and felt. It looked lavish and lush on the screen.
Shortly after, my parents relationship had begun to falter due to the weight of the financial stresses put upon them. My dad’s job, being solely commission based, was not as lucrative as he hoped it would be. We moved back to Carol City, without my mother.
I look back at that time now and it’s colored with shades of grey, white, a cold, detached, and desaturated blue. Feelings of despair and disconnection wash over me when I reflect on those moments. There were many good times, but it ultimately didn’t work out the way any of us had hoped for. There was a mess at home.
OKAMi Tav is a phenomenal young artist with a distinct sound. The 20 year-old, brooding, and melodic star-to-be from Kalamazoo, Michigan has extreme potential and we get a microcosm of that potential on display on Tav’s latest release, THE LAKE EFFECT, a two song EP that showcases his range and versatility.
The first track, “It’s A Mess At Home,” is cold and detached. It feels as though Okami is letting us into his world. He lays out a vivid picture, with spacey vocals over a gorgeous, moody piano sample. It’s slow, yet deliberately paced.
He spits, “The most is done, a title in bold I said...” and the bar is equal parts evocative and enlightening. Tav is a storyteller, first and foremost. No matter the vibe or mood, he sets the scene for an experience.
Okami continues, allowing us a peek into his world, he laments... “Take my place if you know how I feel / I could never do that to you, no...”
He’s letting us know, although you may know how I feel, I would never wish my experience on anyone. There’s a mess at home.
The Lake Effect is available on all streaming platforms.