★★★★★
Rainwater The title of Citizen Cope's fifth album, One Lovely Day, is fitting--if your idea of a lovely day is one spent wrapped up in a blanket while the world outside rages on. The record doesn't stray too far from Cope's sound (his deep, sandpaper voice over slow blues/ soul incantations with the slight swirl of hip-hop flourishes), but One Lovely Day may be his most meditative release yet...
- www.relix.com
2012-08-10
★★★★★
Citizen Cope ? aka Clarence Greenwood, former DJ for arty D.C. hip-hoppers Basehead ? fuses R&B, hip-hop and funk-rock so smoothly that you'd be forgiven for assuming he simply waters down all three. This is sometimes true: The sleepy, drifting "D'artagnan's Theme" is as tasteful and flavorless as Evian. But more often, Cope maximizes the soul in big beats, fluid guitar and his oddly affecting lisp...
- www.blender.com
2010-08-22
★★★★★
A former hip-hop turntablist, Clarence Greenwood (a.k.a. Citizen Cope) takes his career as a folk singer seriously. In fact, he seems to take everything seriously. Greenwood's fourth album presents grave acoustic blues suffused with Citizen Cope's mush-mouthed, half-rapped delivery and a few electro touches. On "Lifeline," Greenwood delivers bad, poetry-slam-style lyrics about hard times ("The cops got guns and the poor folks got sons who work for Mr...
- www.rollingstone.com
2010-03-25
★★★★★
With a sleepy drawl and acoustic guitar, Citizen Cope has found success in simplicity. His unabashedly emotional third disc veers away from past hip-hop influences and plunges deep into blues and folk. "Back Together" is easily the catchiest fare. The anthemic track finds a typically downtrodden Cope exuding positivity while admitting, "Things ain't gone my way...
- www.urb.com
2010-02-13
★★★★★
Simple, soulful, and street-smart, Cope's third disc, Every Waking Moment, is buttressed byhis usual array of churchy organ riffs and gentle hip-hop beats. Thedifference is that the raspy-voiced singer (born Clarence Greenwood) ismore introspective, abandoning the offbeat characters (mostly hustlersand underdogs) who often inhabit his songs...
- ew.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
Although singer-songwriter Citizen Cope (nee Clarence Greenwood) has a
monotone vocal style that recalls melancholy soul man Bill Withers fused with slack rapper Beck, he draws the listener in closer with his sophomore disc's downtrodden tales and hybrid hip-hop, folk and soul sound. On "Fame," which creeps along with haunting organ and piano chords, he bemoans the disintegration of the American Dream...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08
★★★★★
Clarence Greenwood has made a name for himself blending hip-hop, rock and R&B; into songs that have as much in common with singer-songwriters like Jack Johnson as, say, Beck. Every Waking Moment keeps up Cope's organic-feeling brew with more haziness than usual, outfitting beat-driven soundscapes with sunbaked melodies, soul snippets and assorted flotsam...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08
★★★★★
The mere fact that citizen Cope melds hip-hop with folk, soul and blues is not what makes his music resonate, although his unique spiritual hybrid reminds one of how jazz artists who absorbed rock raised eyebrows in the Sixties. Cope feels this combination deeply, and that's what steers this collection of narrative songs and streetwise sounds in the direction of the divine. Clarence Greenwood, a Washington, D.C...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-06-08