4 out of 5

Label: Turbo

Produced by: David Michael Cross

This was… unexpected. I thought I was moderately familiar with Ed Upton’s (aka DMX Krew’s) discography, as intimidating as it can be, but I always lose the place of Ed’s many aliases in that musical timeline. So a David Michael Cross release – with the name a clever “bacronym” for DMX – didn’t ping on my radar. Additionally, the history on this is all confuzzled: setting aside that it’s currently accessible via the DMX Krew bandcamp page, some sites from which I was trying to get some background don’t even tie this to Ed, and furthermore don’t identify that its history as a 1983 release is fictional. It’s a believable fiction from afar, given Ed’s preference for old school equipment, and that he’s been releasing tracks for a long ass time, but 1983 puts Ed at, like, 11 years old according to his wiki birth year, and… yeah. Was Ed making music at 11? Sure, maybe probably. Could it have been this good? Come on.

Turbo’s vinyl cut of this is a reissue of a 2003 White Leather release. While I’m primarily reviewing the content, as this is my first copy of the album, there are some knocks here to the reissue itself, although one of those knocks… I can’t be certain of, but it’s my review so I get to whinge a bit.

Knock the First: a misprint on the back cover. It’d be “cool” if this misprint was part of the original, but from some lower quality screenshots I’ve found, in addition to this slightly higher res one – https://www.hhv.de/en-US/records/item/david-michael-cross-cold-war-1186954 – the misprint appears to be new. Is it a big deal? Nah, it’s a couple misplaced letters at the start of the album narrative on the back cover. Maybe that’s charming, or maybe it’s sloppy. Either way, it’s a weird blip that I’m noting.

Knock the Second: no lyrics. This may have only been a CD-only inclusion originally, as I can’t find any images confirming otherwise or much about the contents of the first LP release, but let’s assume it was initially bundled with the vinyl as well. Bummer not to include those here.

But okay! Cut to 2023, and White Leather parent label Turbo is ready to do a 20-year anniversary rerelease of this faux 1983 album, which is called “Cold War,” has album art depicting the US and USSR flag side by side, and has a two-part opener, vocals-included, house-y ode to giving peace a chance, man. …And it is glorious, glorious stuff. Ed’s love for retro stylings (and analog equipment) would seem to produce kitsch that, in other’s hands, would rub me the wrong way, but there’s something so sincere in Ed’s take on it that I don’t even need any caveats to explain it: I just love it. While, holistically, Ed’s lean towards the club scene means that his tracks occasionally loop or go on too long, and the breadth of work he produces means some singles just don’t shine as much as others, I am constantly surprised by the vast amount of his output, and still surprised even beyond that when I discover a whole album that just knocks my socks off. The wildest thing about Cold War is that it’s “believable” – if remarkable – as a 1983 release, but still works as a sock-knocked as 2003 release, or as a 2023 release; it’s that fresh, and that fun. The vocals-based tracks are split up effectively, in case that’s not your preference, but this is where the sincerity comes into play: yeah, that’s DMX singing, and the rhymes are pretty cheesy, but they’re sung without a wink, and… they’re catchy! I don’t sing along to many things, and here I am, singing along.

The narrative adds to that. While this album would work just as an anti-war piece, it gets goofy with transhumanism and ascension with the Elohim on the B-side, moving the social “commentary” into deep cut conspiracy stuff, which… could be even deeper cut social commentary, but is probably just a bit of fun. I know that may cut against the sincerity I mention, though the distinction is that this doesn’t feel like Ed trying to be overly cute or clever, and rather just starting from a musical era for which he has reverence, finding a theme that resonates, and letting the ideas (and music) grow from there. That “growth” means this ends up going far beyond the initial kitsch – and admittedly where it’s probably easier for listeners smarter than m’self to spot this as a more modern release – and touches on some ambient / noise on Nuclear Winter, and shifts into electro (versus more synth-based, poppy tunes) once the sci-fi narrative emerges. Closer Star Gate kind of catches on the looping I mentioned – every other track here has either a verse-chorus-verse structure that keeps it flowing, or layers in bass or synth lines in an escalating, exciting manner, but the closer is just kind of a trade-off between a synth and a vocoder sample, over and over. However, factoring it into the storyline as a kind of 2001 tunnel trip… it seems right. It’s a good closer, and resets your brain for the automatic uplift of the poptunes that open the record up, when you hit play again.