Power trio Th1rt3en fuels with kerosene on raw, poignant “Exorcism”

The band Th1rt3en is veteran rapper Pharaohe Monche, soulful blues guitar slinger Marcus Machado, and the punchy syncopated thump of jack of all trades drummer Daru Jones. The trio unites to form a sound I can only begin to describe as a mash of blazing fiery hip hop, assertive funk, and creepy cutting samples and sound; all combine to formulate the universe of their debut record A Magnificent Day For an Exorcism. 

To paraphrase Monche, the album’s title refers to the world and it needing a “cleansing” due to moral decay. A student tortured into school shooting insanity by constant bullies and beatings, violent conflicts and death brought on by the brutal actions of police, dealing with the constant fallout of racism as a person of color… it is a list of heavy tolls. 

Despite that, Monche takes hearty bites of these heady matters with gusto; his carnivorous rhymes stripping apart the haters and competition alike with piranha-toothed glee, backed by the dual ninja slice of Jones and Machado acting as a backcourt of merciless Avengers. The trio swoons, battles, and machine guns through tracks like “The Magician”, “Goats Head”, “666”, and “Triskaidekaphobia”, barely stopping to hold still for the sad breath of a wistfully slipped “Amnesia”. 

While it’s brief sidebar amidst the louder issues, “Amnesia” is one of the tracks that stuck with me longest from “Exorcism”. It’s a beautiful relationship between musicians playing in sync together to give life and form to the same sonic wavelength. Monche deconstructs a soldier damaged in the ICU who slowly has his mind ebb away through each razor-sharp tightened bar, Jones thrums on an ever-steady rich backbeat, and Machado lands a dancing solo into the track’s conclusion that scatters like constellations into the midnight. 

“Amnesia” is a sobering drop before the marathon march of closer “Kill, Kill, Kill”, which brings Exorcism back onto its breathless path for a final conclusion; a fatigued yet triumphant boxer throwing out his last flurry of haymakers. This is an album that may be too thematically intense for some listeners, but it involves the type of conversations we need to be having more and more in this day and age. 

And that’s where it begins: by shutting up and listening.