The HeART Gallery by T Walker

The HeART Gallery by T Walker

 

         "IF A PICTURE SAYS A THOUSAND WORDS, THEN I SHALL CRAM A GALLERY IN A VERSE." These sixteen words are the first words I heard by T Walker on his album, The HeART Gallery. No not in a song, in a spoken word poem. His poetry is the intro track to the album and right after I heard that line I knew that this album was going to be good. The HeART Gallery is T Walker's first official album, it dropped August 3rd of last year and in my opinion, is one of the best albums you'll get for 5 dollars. T Walker was born in Wilmington, Delaware and was raised in Jacksonville, North Carolina and of all the artists I've been in contact with, T Walker is by far one of the most honest emcees I've ever talked to, and listened to. First of all you can hear the truths in his lyrics, like on the song Addiction, he literally tells you what his addictions are, and in that song he asks, "What's YOUR addiction, what's YOUR affliction?" I capitalized "your" because when I heard this song, it really got me thinking about myself and truthfully it caused some self-conviction for me. Another song that really stood out to me when it comes to lyrics, was the track titled Dreams. This track has a smooth beat, and lyrics that get you thinking on what dreams you have, and how you're going to make those dreams come true. When I first listened to this album I was really surprised by the first six tracks because of how truthful and genuine the songs were, to sum it up the first six tracks were as good as any. Honestly, there isn't one song I didn't immediately like within the first half of the album, now the second half was a little different story for me.
         If you read the reviews on this blog then you may have previously read that I have a hard time liking a song or album that is filled with raps about smoking or drinking, and when I first listened to this album, that's all I thought the last half of the album was about. I'm not saying that EVERY single song after track six is about smoking and drinking, I'm just saying that you see the songs about smoking and drinking on the back half of the album. Though, I wasn't ready to write off this album just yet, I mean the first six tracks were all deep and had meanings and truths, so surely these songs had to have deeper meanings, so what did I do? I asked T Walker himself. T Walker had this to say, "I smoke a lot when creating and...well...just a lot, and I'm always writing in the moment. They do have deeper meaning though. Songs like Addiction, I really had to just be honest with myself. Yes I smoke recreationally but I did notice myself becoming dependent on it for different reasons so I put that out there because I know people can relate. They all have deeper meaning but in the process I wasn't really self conscious of how much of that I was taking away from the music by always including my substance abuse." This excerpt brings me back to when I previously stated T Walker as being one of the most honest emcees I've heard. Now that I had this new outlook on those particular songs, I went back, listened to the entire album, and I actually could sense deeper meanings than just smoking. This isn't me just saying that I really mean that. It wasn't like every song I originally thought was about smoking, now came off to me as a deep, philosophical song, I could just sense that on a few of the songs I didn't like at first, did have some deeper things to take away than just smoking. So this album definitely allowed me to be more open minded to rappers, and some songs because maybe there is a deep message, its just overshadowed by references of drugs and alcohol.
         Another question I asked T Walker was, what does this album mean to him, and what did he want to accomplish with this album. He told me that this album was a learning process for him, he said he recorded and mixed all the songs so it was experimental in that sense, and he also said it was therapeutic because he was able to vent through his music. T Walker stated that since the release of The HeART Gallery, he is able to dig deeper inside himself and create better music, and even more honest music. He said not that he hasn't before but he's able to self reflect a lot more and able to point out and even write about his own flaws, failures and fears and conquer them! In conclusion I think that this album made me much more open minded to rap as a whole, and it taught me not to write off certain songs, or albums before I know the story behind it. Go get this album!

* You can buy this album on bandcamp for only 5 dollars here and check out T Walker's official website http://www.twalkerofficial.com/ and follow him on twitter @TWalkerNC