Vinyl LP
In a recent interview with 15 Questions, Joseph Shabason proclaimed, “nothing feels more boring than a clearly defined narrative that has no room for misinterpretation or misunderstanding.” Which leads to the question: What’s less boring and more widely misinterpreted than the idea of hell? Some say it’s a place of eternal punishment, while others believe in a portal for reincarnation. Joseph Shabason adds fuel to the flame with Welcome to Hell, re-scoring an iconic 1996 skateboarding video of the same name.
Shabason has been releasing concept albums since the start of his solo career. 2017’s Aytche explored his grandparents’ Holocaust survival in heartbreaking yet utterly beautiful songs. Anne, from 2018, processes his mother’s struggle with Parkinson’s disease, and 2021’s The Fellowship, explores his spiritual journey growing up in an Islamic and Jewish dual-faith household. Welcome to Hell continues in this vein; it’s a bold addition, synopsizing Shabason’s musical canon of personal hardships, accentuated by meditative, ambient, jazz-inflected soundtracks.
This time around, there’s a little more chutzpah, thanks to his affinity for skateboarding—another medium for raw and authentic self-expression. We return once again to Shabason’s childhood, where as a 14-year-old, he was enraptured by Toy Factory’s impossibly punk 31-minute montage of brilliance and bravado. Each track on Welcome to Hell pays homage to a specific skateboarder’s section from the original video. But where The Misfits, Black Sabbath, and Sonic Youth accompanied furious grinds and slides in the original, Shabason opts for mostly serene sounds that recall Jon Hassell, Azymuth, and Miles Davis circa In a Silent Way.
There’s a plethora of styles that make up the album, pieced together by the distinct personalities of each skater in the video. The effortless cool of Donny Barley is rebranded via silky, sketched-out vocals, muted, distant trumpet, and tastefully-refined echo over a faintly pulsating rhythm. The street smarts of Mike Maldonado beget a deep and dissonant funk. The power and precision of Ed Templeton summon some breathy sax and syncopated, industrial percussion. The title track and album closer is a more gentle auditory embrace featuring the album’s only lyrics, written by guitarist Thom Gil. It’s the album’s most acute juxtaposition, accompanying the video’s “bail” section, known to be one of the most brutal of its era and not for the faint of heart. “The place where you are final finally,” Gil sings. “Yes, please jump through, you don’t recognize its form.” Welcome to Hell—it is what you make it.
