Sometimes, two tracks are all it takes to map out a crumbling world. With an EP titled after the very foundations of the American dream—“Hold These Truths”—Richard Scott Davis doesn’t deliver a history lesson; he delivers a thermal shock. It’s raw, it’s real, and it scratches exactly where it hurts.

Side A: Deep Freeze and Blood on the Ice

It all begins in “Minneapolis”. Davis plunges us into an urban noir where the wind howls through freezing Boom Bap kicks. The French-spoken intro—a gravelly, low-register voice—sets the stage: here, “truth” tastes like betrayal.

Davis doesn’t hide behind metaphors; he names the fallen: Renée Good and Alex Pretti. Two lives cut short, two names etched into the vinyl to denounce the ruthless machinery of ICE. This immigration enforcement squad, turned into a political weapon under the Trump administration, is pinpointed here as the executioner of a tattered dream. The track honors the victims with a sort of revolted grace. Then, a sudden breath of air: a saxophone flight à la Charlie Parker, as if Bird’s ghost came back to warm the frozen hands of the sacrificed. It’s dark, it’s political, it’s visceral.

Side B: The Fever of Identity

Then, without warning, Davis teleports us under the Spanish Harlem sun. His rework of Joe Bataan’s “Mestizo” is a tour de force. Where others would settle for a carbon copy, he injects a predator’s groove. The bassline is a rubber band snapping against the pavement. Just when you think you’ve caught the vibe, Davis hits us with a masterful “beat switch”: the Latin Soul takes a 90s Hip-Hop right hook. The flow sharpens, the scratches slice through the air, and the celebration of “rainbow skin” becomes the ultimate barricade against division.

The Verdict

Richard Scott Davis signs a two-act manifesto. “Hold These Truths” is a bridge built between social rage and the joy of unity—between the Minnesota frost and the Puerto Rican heat. It’s a record that smells of crate-digging dust and the urgency of the struggle.