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Single · 2022

Open Mic Hours

by Mara Voss

Two city-traffic stories rapped like slam poems over dusty jazz loops, recorded the week the open mic met the drum machine.

Tracks

  1. 1. Parallel Park PressureThis was the first poem I ever heard over a beat, and I'm still a little annoyed at how well the horns fit. Parallel parking is the most honest form of confidence I know.jazz rap, boom bap3:15
  2. 2. Toll Booth PhilosopherI sat in rush-hour traffic and started giving the toll booth worker my life story in my head. The bars came out dry because that's how the day felt.jazz rap, lyrical rap4:10

Liner notes

I wrote both of these on the back of receipts between shifts, still thinking in three-minute slam rounds. A friend slid a jazz loop under the first verse and suddenly my poems had a pulse. We tracked it in a borrowed bedroom with the elevated train shaking the window, and I left the rumble in because it felt like the city co-signing every bar.

Mara Voss