Last January, Joe Rocca released Hybride, his second solo album and first offering in nearly seven years. As part of Coup de cœur francophone this Friday, the Quebec MC and member of Dead Obies will perform at Ausgang Plaza to present his latest project. It’s the perfect opportunity to discover (or rediscover) this assertive work featuring a renewed Rocca.
The first thing you notice about this opus is that sensuality and love are two ofHybride‘s central themes, as they were on French Kiss, her first opus released in 2017. However, her lyrics have more content than before; her pen particularly shines on introspective tracks like 21 Grammes or 4AM. The maturity he has acquired and the ground he has covered since the glory days of Dead Obies are on the menu.
On Hybride, Joe Rocca is much more of a singer than a rapper, with tracks concocted for the most part by Worry, Jean-Michel Frédéric and Félix Petit. The Quebecer navigates with ease between R&B, funk, pop and hip-hop. The excellent Focus, the album’s centerpiece, is a perfect example of the 30-year-old artist’s versatility.
Alongside him, Rocca counts on contributions from soul-pop duo Rau_Ze, KNLO, Malia Laura and three of his Dead Obies compatriots: Ogee Rodman, Greg Beaudin and 20some. It’s on Told Ya, a curtain-raiser, that the reunion takes place, giving life to the most rap track of the lot. The whole thing is effective and well orchestrated, but the song leaves us somewhat wanting more.
With this offering, the MC highlights himself as a versatile artist who never stops reinventing himself to express his amorous impulses and states of mind. A nod to his iconic line on Montréal $ud in 2013; with Hybride, he has clearly defined who Joe Rocca is…
