Dual Review: Gone Wallace - Highway 35(EP) and Cult Classic

Have you ever sworn to yourself that you’re going to do something, but you don’t do it right away? Then time passes and you never get around to doing it. When you finally get around and have time to do it you realize the time has passed and there’s no longer any chance to do it.  That’s what happened here and the reason you’re getting a dual review, an EP and an album. Consider my procrastination a lesson.

First let’s talk about Highway 35. It’s an EP from Gone Wallace and the prelude to his album Cult Classic, which we’ll talk about later. According to Gone Wallace this EP was inspired by the death of his grandfather. Wallace put a lot of things before going to see his grandfather and thus didn’t get to be with him in his final moments. Those things are what inspired this EP. It’s short, 5 tracks about all the things he put before his grandfather.

Women, money, rapping and everything else you expect from a rapper are covered in the first 3 tracks. The next two tracks bring the events full circle. Wallace is haunted by the guilt of not being there for his grandparents. The EP is only five tracks but it gets the point across. It begins with some catchy upbeat tracks about all the things we love to hear in songs when we’re riding through the town with our friends. Then it brings us crashing down. The topic changes to guilt, feelings of failure and turning to alcohol in an attempt to hide these feelings. “Jesse” is basically a track about Wallace feeling like he’ll never make it big because he’s too different from what’s become the status quo in hip hop. Highway 35 is a short EP that simply gives you a view into the mind of Wallace and what’s he’s all about, setting up for Cult Classic.

Download Highway 35

From Highway 35 it’s obvious that Gone Wallace is an artist that’s a mixture of old school style, with a new school flow over soul beats. Imagine Scarface style lyrics where no topic is off limits, with an Earl Sweatshirt flow over American Gangster instrumentals. When you say those things it sounds like you should just skip that music because it’s trying to do too much at once, but if you skip this Cult Classic you should kick yourself. While it sounds like a lot it’s not. Wallace manages to seamlessly tie these styles together and create a unique style of his own, something that isn’t often done in today’s hip hop scene.

The theme of Cult Classic is of course cult classics. Each track makes references to a film that ca0n be considered a cult classic. Films aren’t the only thing referenced as Sega’s Dreamcast system, Bo Jackson, Doug Funny, Aretha Franklin and even Anita Baker. On the surface it’s a fun album but similar to Highway 35, if you look deeper there’s much more to it. It’s great when you can have an album keep a consistent theme throughout yet give each track an individual feel.

While the instrumentals all share a similar style, there’s absolutely no way that you can confuse one for another. I contribute to Wallace having a great ability for choosing instrumentals that fit the project. Samples are also used nicely. They’re not shoved in for the sake of being there. They’re well place and actually add to the concept and quality of songs. Too many times samples are simply shoved in to have some sort of random connection with the listeners. Not here, they’re nicely placed and each one has a reason.

Lyrically Wallace is just spectacular. I’m still trying to find a verse that slacks, but it’s hard. You can tell he takes his time and crafts tracks a bar at a time. There’s no randomly placed lyrics just because he has some extra space before the hook. There’s nothing crammed in because he wrote an extra bar that he really needs to cram in. Even the hooks are nice. His flow is also really nice but he can switch it on a track at any moment. All of this seems well rehearsed and it comes off as a quality and professional piece of art.

Down points of the album is that not all the vocals are level on some of the features. There’s not a lot of features so in the whole of the album this doesn’t make much of a difference. If I had to pick one track that was my least favorite it would probably be “No Offseasons”.” I’m just not a fan of the track but it does serve it’s purpose of being a pick up. The album is somewhat slow and “No Offseasons” help transition into a section of faster paced songs and it does that well. The vocals are also uneaven on this one. It’s my least favorite track but it’s probably someone else’s favorite. 

My favorite track is either “Vincent Vega” “Bueller II” Or “Tyler Durden.” Vincent Vega is an awesome track that all about one of the most iconic characters of all time Vincent Vega from Pulp Fiction. The coolest part of the track comes when the song is over. It’s just random conversation about nothing. Quinten Tarintino is famous for side conversations in his films. The foot fetish in Pulp Fiction or the klan mask in Django Unchained. Somehow that conversation validates Wallace as a man who actually enjoys cult classics and isn’t just trying to fill an album with references to get some attention. It gives the album a level of credibility and lets you know you’re going to hear some references most people would over look. “Beuller II” is just you’re average laid back, I’m not doing anything track. It’s made great by the use of the Barry White Sample. Somehow Barry White saying “I don’t want to work that hard” makes you want to drop everything and say “You’re right Barry.” But every track on the album is solid and well crafted.

 “Tyler Durden,” is just an awesome track because it really embodies what the movie Fight Club is about it. There’s a duality on the track. Similar to The Narrator and Tyler Durden, there’s and anxiety ridden Wallace and Wallace willing to snatch anything he wants from the world. There’s no reason we need any of the expensive things we waste money on to keep up appearances, but we want them anyway. It’s like one side is telling us “go out and take it all, it’s your destiny and you should be great” the other side is saying “hold back, there’s no reason to do it, you don’t need.” The track excellently portrays the two sides that we all have. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Harvey Dent and Two Face, Tyler Durden and The Narrator, it’s all about which side we let have the most control. I’m going to move on to scoring because I can analyze Fight Club and thus “Tyler Durden” all day. I love this track almost as much as I love the movie and that’s a lot of love.

• Lyricism-7
• Flow-8
• Production-6
• Theme-8
• Replayability- 8
• Individuality-7

Final score is 7.3/10 While a cult classic isn’t necessarily loved by everyone, it’s able to garner the attention and affection of many. Most people will never see most cult classics but those who do usually have a special place in their hearts for them. Most people have never seen The Warriors film from 1972, but those that do have nothing but love for the movie. The Cult Classic album is a cult classic. It would be great if millions of people would hear this album, but they probably won’t. However, those who do hear this album will have nothing but love for it.

Download Cult Classic

You can check out Gone Wallace on SoundCloud and Twitter
Follow @GoneWallace


You can find me on the CP Time Podcast and Twitter
Follow @OriginalKingD