SoulTre Not Too Old To Bounce, But I was Looking For More Wisdom

Whatever my reservations on their eponymous single, the song is a lovely rap and soul track.

SoulTre is a combination of the musicians Eliah Soul and Tre-Dot. Eliah Soul is the producer and Tre-Dot is the emcee.

When it comes to duos like this, I’m reminded of Gang Starr, which was made up of DJ Premier and Guru.

There's a lot going on on SoulTre's eponymous single. The song, over a standard rap beat, starts with the booming words 'Beautiful people'.

Apparently, it's a song that SoulTre wants you to believe is a livestage evening performance.

The song is also a self-referential song. Apart from it being eponymous, Dot, as his mate calls him on the song, addresses his audience (the 'beautiful people'), addressing their curiosity as to how it sounds when soul is mixed with a 'little bit of Hip hop'.

This is the start of the song, the intro, if you will. And then Dot starts rapping in his booming voice, rapping about whose toes hurt, even though their man told them 'not to wear those shoes'. And then the song gets self-referential again: Dot raps that his audience must not assume from his grey beard that his song won't hit, and as he raps he also mentions the name of their group.

The soul part must be when they sing, very beautifully and smoothly

'SoulTre, SoulTre; It's the way we move, making everybody move

This part is beautiful and you have to wonder: isn't SoulTre's music more Hip hop than soul? Then the confusing part: does Tre-Dot do both the rapping and singing? Cause to me it sounds like two different vocalists on the song, even though one half of the group is said to be a producer.

The song also touches on how the pair teamed up. Dot raps that Eliah 'made the call'. There's a mention of a girl with a beautiful smile, but all of this is said in passing. SoulTre has not decided to stick to one major theme. They talk about the audience, their history, some women and whole lot of stuff.

I  praise their rhyming skill but it can be argued that every rapper can rhyme. So what will stick with me listening to their song is Dot rapping about 'we ain't too old to bounce'.

This is important: everybody can rhyme, especially young rappers. But looking at their pictures, Elias Soul and Tre-Dot are older musicians. More than being able to rhyme, I think what's more important is what they have to say.