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Pretend I'm Human
1999 studio album by Orange 9mm From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Pretend I'm Human is the third and final album by the American band Orange 9mm, released on July 13, 1999.[1][2] It was a commercial disappointment.[3] Pretend I'm Human was rereleased in 2021.[4]
The band supported it by playing the 1999 Warped Tour; they also toured with Machine Head.[5][6]
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Production
Recorded in California, Pretend I'm Human was produced by Neil Perry.[7][8] The band abandoned all of its demoed songs once they were in the studio, opting instead to start over.[9] Vocalist Chaka Malik played bass on the album.[10] The lyrics to many of the songs touch on themes of societal power dynamics and class.[11]
Critical reception
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Exclaim! wrote that "Touching Skies" "may be the best, if not the only, rap-metal power ballad ever."[18] The Telegram & Gazette deemed the album the band's best yet, praising the "rap-inspired grooves, sharper dynamic shifts and overall better chops."[8] The Arizona Daily Star determined that Malik's "words are racy enough to turn a sailor incarnadine, yet his rap is fantastically caustic poetry."[11]
The New York Post noted that Orange 9mm "is still their hard-core selves on this 10-song collection, which taps hip-hop, industrial and good old-fashioned Stairway-to-Hell metal."[19] The Winnipeg Sun concluded that the "NYC trio manages to weld heavy riffs and hip-hop rhythms without getting them all over each other."[17] The San Diego Union-Tribune stated that "the lurching guitars in the Fugazi-like 'Lifeless', the explosive title track and even the slow build-up in 'Touching Skies', a rather preachy song about self-determination, have a raw, punk edge to them that you won't find in other so-called new metal bands."[20]
AllMusic wrote that, "even if Malik has a better lyrical flow than most rap-metal singers, the results tend to sound stiff and forced when there are no funky backing rhythms for him to play off of."[12] In 2021, Decibel called Pretend I'm Human "extraordinarily eclectic," noting that the reissue "brings the guitars to the fore [to] make it a perfect ahead-of-its-time candidate for reevaluation."[21]
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Track listing
Personnel
- Orange 9mm
- Chaka Malik – vocals
- Taylor McLam – guitars, bass
- Matthew Cross – drums
- Additional
- Sacha Jenkins – backing vocals
- Neil Perry – producer, engineer, mixing, keyboards, programming
- Rafael Serrano – engineer
- Howie Weinberg – mastering
References
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