Dan “The Man”
A Cleveland, Ohio Hero Returns Home For New Mixtape Release
Dans Homecoming album is a vibrant, wildly funny compilation that transcends any attempt to dismiss it as mere novelty. Novelty records are throwaways -- cheap gags that are funny once, but never pay off with repeat plays, something that Homecoming certainly does with over 30k streams on the first day it was released to the public. Homecoming is layered like any good story. Corny jokes, gross-out tales, flights of fancy, and sheer absurdist humor co-exist comfortably, usually within the course of one song. Take "Believe’Land USA," Dan’s breakthrough single and timeless Cleveland sports party anthem. Within that one song, Dan “The Man” spills out countless jokes, spinning between inspired allusions and thuddingly obvious cut-ups, which are equally funny because of the irrepressible, infectious nature of his rap. And he's so confident in his skills, he's sexy, which is kind of what the album is about. Thevery name of the album should be a clear indication that Dan “The Man” doesn't take any of this stuff all that seriously while creating elaborate, fantastical settings that reveal boundless imagination. The showiest number, of course, is the "Dance With Me" suite that concludes the mixtape, built around his idea of every woman being beautiful and flexible enough to cater to any mans fantasies (even loving BBW women before it was in vogue), but his skill at creating distinctive worlds is just as apparent on the endless party of "Wet Bar" featuring the humorously talented Leggo Nash (AKA Mr. Fresher Than Yo Bitch) from the West side of Chicago, Illinois. These are the things that are buried beneath his jokes and an enormous amount of movie samples. Much of the music on Homecoming uses the reverb canon as the foundation whereas his predecessor Shock G would typically lean on P-Funk samples by George Clinton. It's so strong an influence, it may seem easy to reduce Dan “The Man” to the status of a mere Shock G imitator, but Dantakes his blueprint, expands it, and personalizes it, creating a mixtape that is as loose and funny as anything in theParliament Funkadelic empire, and thanks to the internet, in some ways, easier to access, since the party feels wide open. Few hip-hop albums sound as much like a constant party as this, and years later, it's still going to be impossible to resist.