Released on April 4, 2024,
on Fake Four Inc.
A long time ago, back in 2006, Ceschi released his first classic album, They Hate Francisco False, a singular object that, truth be told, was more pop-rock than rap, sounding as though the Beatles had emerged not in the England of the Swinging Sixties, but in Los Angeles, amid the restless energy of the Project Blowed era. Then, in 2024, almost twenty years later, the character from that concept album resurfaced in the title of his new record. The callback is all the more explicit as the album opens, on “Let’s Begin,” with poetry from a guest who had appeared on that earlier record, the delightful Penny.
Bring Us The Head Of Francisco False, Part 1, however, is no comeback. It is an ending. Together with its second installment, released a year later, it closes the chapter that began with Ceschi’s debut album, Fake Flowers. Assisted on production – alongside Child Actor and a few others – by Factor and Maker, two veterans of the indie-rap scene, and joined on the mic by one of its heirs, R.A.P. Ferreira, Ceschi brings to an end a fertile era marked by outstanding albums and dangerous games with drugs.
The day you realize that you mean nothing is everything.
That is the subtitle of this first installment, and it sets the tone. For this farewell, Ceschi once again explores his great theme: disillusionment. Along with a healthy dose of indie ideology – big business corrupted hip-hop and trampled all over us, the purists – his frustration, resentment and bitterness as a half-failed artist resurface over the powerful punk of “Beginning Of A New Era.” The beautiful “Keep It Inside” is a letter of disappointed love, one that could just as easily be addressed to his audience as to the loved one whose loss he mourns. It is all very bleak, even if Ceschi does make peace with his life on “We Are Enough.”
Ceschi is a disillusioned man who believed in love and tilted at windmills. He admits it himself: he is “Dumb Quixote”. But his troubles do not stem solely from his psyche. He has been through painful experiences. Life has confronted him with ordeals, such as seeing his grandfather carried away in a body bag (while R.A.P. Ferreira saw his father taken away in handcuffs), as recounted on “Victor Jara.” It has made him mourn a lost friend, according to “Lazarus, Too.” And then the world we find ourselves in is hardly a beautiful place. According to “Fin,” it is a world of war and racism; according to “Santa Lucia,” one of post-truth – and there are plenty of reasons to want out. It is a world of dashed hopes, a graveyard for every aspiration.
This final chapter also contains what has always been irritating about Ceschi. He is now in his forties, yet his raps still resemble the diary of a troubled teenager. And yet his strengths remain a delight. The rapper, singer and guitarist still excels at transcending musical genres and turning out one beautiful, varied and inspiring track after another. This American Manu Chao takes us through the farthest corners of the world’s musical landscape, as when he recalls his Hispanic roots at the beginning of the experimental “Victor Jara.” A true music lover, he draws on several decades of pop history, as when he and Maker reinvent Bowie’s “Space Oddity” on “Lazarus, Too.” He is driven by a constant desire to question himself and explore new directions, as when he ventures into Auto-Tune (or is it a vocoder?) on “We Are Enough.”
This album could hardly be a definitive farewell. It is difficult to believe that it is. In fact, it merely brings Ceschi’s solo career to a close, while he continues on with Codefendants, the punk hip-hop band he formed with Get Dead’s Sam King and NOFX’s Fat Mike. It is the beginning of a new era, as he loudly proclaims on the track of the same name. One hopes so, for his sake. Even though the era brought to a close by the two Bring Us The Head Of Francisco False albums was pretty damn good.
