Beside Myself – WILLS

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WILLS is not a household name. In fact, a simple google search will leave you right where you started. I’m happy to make introductions: everyone, meet Will Johnson. Best known for his "Woes vs. Whoas" track, which was made in 2016 but gained popularity for being featured in a TV commercial for the 2019 Acura ILX. That should tell you all you need to know about WILLS’ struggle with commercial (no pun intended) success. Not that he’s dependent on the typical avenues for artistic success. His album, “The New Old”, was funded via a fellowship by the Jerome Foundation in Minnesota.

"Beside Myself", like the rest of songs from his album, “The New Old”, was created from an old gospel record. Sounds a lot like the same sample Just Blaze used on the Drake hit, "Lord Knows". And if you know anything about the resume of Just Blaze you know this song hits HARD. Has that same epic fullness of a Baptist choir showing out for the Lord. The way WILLS starts and stops the sample adds more energy to the track, giving you a bite and then taking it away. Add to the amazing instrumental lyrics like:

“I try to get on the right side / Look on the bright side / Get back in my right mind / I've been beside myself / Tryna get back inside myself / Back in my right mind”

This is music to quit your job at its best, where you simultaneously gain introspection (lyrics) and courage (instrumental) to get back on the right side.

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You can learn more about WILLS here:

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About the Curator - Ben Young:

Ben Young lives a life of polarity. He has split his life between the coasts: half his life on the West (California) and half on the East (Georgia and Virginia). He has pursued careers in the art world (film school graduate) and the corporate world (executive with Fortune 500 companies). And he is Biracial, the personification of being two things at once.

Ben’s musical influences were formed by music loving parents, raised in a world of John Coltrane and John Lennon, James Taylor and James Ingram, Huey Lewis and the News and Prince and the Revolution. Saxophones, electric guitars, synthesizers, and breakbeats filled the air Ben breathed from birth. And being born one year after the birth of Hip Hop, Ben has been joined at the hip with the genre his entire life.

Check out Ben’s blog where you can get more recommendations on great music, presented from a Biracial point of view: www.khameleonkurator.com.