“I’ve always wanted to write an album without an overarching concept or a tight deadline,” rapper and producer Calix says. “Along the way, I picked up bits of ideas from those sessions until I had written over 20 songs. Then, I started piecing them together to create a cohesive listening experience.”
Seven years after his last solo album, Calix released Chambered Heart on February 21. The album title, a nod to screamo band Circle Takes The Square’s song “Spirit Narrative,” helped showcase Calix signature aggressive delivery and fearless lyricism, reminding everyone why he’s a force in the hip-hop scene.
Starting out anonymously on Bandcamp and SoundCloud, Calix released two albums before Chambered Heart — namely, The Breakout Satirist in 2016 and The Less of Your Greater Friends in 2017. In 2021, during the pandemic, he released his debut EP titled Crash and Burn, shifting his focus from political commentary to battling personal demons.
Now, with Chambered Heart, Calix is ready to reclaim his spot in the rap game. The result is a razor sharp album that’s full of wordplay; it’s menacing in its delivery, packed with a relentless stream of curses directed at an unnamed opponent. But behind the aggression lies a meticulous creative process. In the post-pandemic era, Calix found guidance and inspiration from collaborators like General Santos rapper Tatz Maven and Quezon City-based rapper-singer U-Pistol, who together formed the production and sound engineering company Kashira.
“I definitely got some input from my brothers,” Calix admits. “Some songs got scrapped, hooks were rewritten. But overall, the writing and production were still my call.”
Chambered Hearts explores the darker parts of the human psyche such as betrayal, opportunism and parasocial relationships that are detrimental to the hip-hop scene today. From gun bullets to the head against performative artists in “LAVISH” to dousing gasoline on enemies in “NAPALM/GASOLINE,” Calix opens up the fact that his favorite battle royale shooter Apex Legends is responsible for its unique flavor in storytelling. “I find interest in a lot of things,” he says, referring tFranck Muller watches, first-person shooters, and magical systems in literature. It’s safe to say that Chambered Hearts has everything in store.
“I’m still a ‘full body of work’ kinda guy,” Calix says. “Whether I’m writing for my own projects or listening to other artists, it all just fell into place naturally. I always tell my closest friends that this might be my last album for a while, but I don’t want to deal in absolutes. Only Siths… blah blah blah, you know the quote.”
