Reviewed by Steve Hayes

Native of Columbus, Ohio, Yaves is a highly gifted and educated rapper, mixed media expert and church worker. 'In Winters Ear' consists of seven tracks, one standout being the smooth-as-butter "Down Bad" featuring the silky vocals of Zoe Boston with Yaves identifying the problems of the world as problem with the heart. The other standout is the gently epic "Blood Covered Snow" with some compelling story telling. On both tracks, good production and some tight rhyming flows from the rapper show his skills. At other times however, tracks show great promise (like the intro to "Revolver" with Keisha Solei, almost in a Lauryn Hill vein) but then becomes repetitive and indeed the lyricism and delivery isn't up with 'In Winters Ear''s standout tracks. A shame.

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