At first, the only sound is a dull ring in your ears. It persists, even as the rest of the information makes its way into your fuzzy brain. You struggle to process what you just heard, what you saw, what you can't deny is true, for it is only through and after this uncomfortable process that the beat can take over, that you come back to life.
That's what “Froggie” captures, the first track from Will Eastman's latest LP Hilo, an album written in direct response to the self-shattering and life-changing news that the Washington DC producer, DJ, and U Street Music Hall owner was adopted.
“In an instant, nothing seemed real,” Eastman says. “What I knew about my background was based on a fabrication. In a way, my life had been an illusion. I began to distrust reality itself, at the very time I would be forced to recreate an identity. I needed to throw away everything I thought I knew and start over. It was necessary to forge a new identity, but also to survive psychologically.”