ALL: First Impressions

Blu & Exile, Love (the) Ominous World

October 27, 2024

Love (the) Ominous World is Blu’s third album in 2024. In March, he released Out of the Blue with Shafiq Husayn, a sequel to their 2018 album The Blueprint. A pairing with Evidence, Los Angeles, dropped in July. These projects revolve around familiar concerns: fulfilling his hip-hop ambitions, honoring without falling prey to neighborhood (gang) customs, and trying to find spiritual sustenance. “I be rewriting my records like I’m trying to perfect this,” he raps on “Chucks.” It’s the nature of musicianship. Eventually, an artist defines his territory. To his credit, Blu has put out some very good work after completing a pioneering run of lo-fi rap projects (Her Favorite Colo(u)r and Jesus), reuniting with producer Exile for Give Me My Flowers While I Can Still Smell Them, and embarking on what could be described as a post-Below the Heavens career of easygoing, lyrically engaging backpack rap. Bad Neighbor, his 2015 venture with MED and Madlib, remains a fan favorite. As for Ominous World? It suffers from too many guest spots. Georgia Anne Muldrow dominates “Hello L.A.” and Kurupt takes command of “Chucks” with a fiery cameo. The unfortunately titled “Suge Knight” finds Blu taking a label meeting with the notorious boss during Death Row’s ill-fated “new and untouchable” era in the mid-Aughts. “A Song Called Precipitation” reprises Below the Heavens gem “Dancing in the Rain,” albeit with an environmental twist. On “Smack,” he shares the mic with another blog era star, Fashawn. They’re both onetime prospects who crafted solid indie careers for themselves yet arguably deserved much more. Exile released Love (the) Ominous World on his Dirty Science imprint.

Rise of a Killah: My Life in the Wu-Tang by Ghostface Killah

September 30, 2024

Rise of a Killah: My Life in the Wu-Tang is Ghostface Killah’s second book. The first, 2007’s The World According to Pretty Toney, is a collection of “Killah-isms” released through MTV, where he occasionally appeared in quirky bumper ads. Rise of a Killah isn’t quite a full autobiography, either. Much like Eminem’s 2002 book Angry Blonde, it compiles a series of lightly-edited interviews – transcribed by John Helfers of DNES Marketing – in a chronological format. Ghost isn’t big on dates and tends to be impressionistic in details. At two points, he invites longtime friend Grant “Un” Williams and manager Mike Caruso to lend insight. The former relays some wild pre-fame crime stories, while Caruso explains some of the business deals he arranged during Ghost’s busy Def Jam era. Overall, Rise of a Killah leans heavily on Ghostface’s idiosyncratic voice, an amalgam of Staten Island bluster, learned wisdom, and fantastical slang. It’s fascinating but maybe not enough to sustain a 250-page book. Superfans intimately familiar with Ghostface’s unusual career have complained about its dearth of new material. They aren’t wrong. But the main issue with Rise of a Killah is that it feels insufficient in craftsmanship for a hugely talented artist, not because Ghost doesn’t respond to Raekwon’s claim (in his much-better 2021 autobiography From Staircase to Stage) that Ghost slept with Aaliyah. St. Martin’s Press.

Ol’ Dirty Bastard: A Tale of Two Dirtys

September 2, 2024

The A&E documentary Ol’ Dirty Bastard: A Tale of Two Dirtys revisits an oft-told tragedy. Ghostface Killah calls Ol’ Dirty Bastard “the soul of Wu-Tang Clan,” but one can’t help but notice that he and Raekwon are the only members of the group to appear on camera. RZA’s absence is palpable – he and Dirty’s widow, Icelene Jones, have had a contentious relationship since the rapper’s death in 2004. Mariah Carey shows up with her considerable star power to describe how she and Dirty made the classic single “Sweet Fantasy.” Damon Dash, who is far removed from his Roc-a-Fella glory years, bravely addresses why he signed Dirty to a million-dollar deal despite the rapper displaying troubling signs of schizophrenia while in prison, and clearly needing therapy upon release. There’s a lot of great camcorder home videos from Icelene that gives the documentary a poignant intimacy. But too much of Dirty’s work after Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version is cast in a negative light. An Elektra Records executive claims that his second album, 1999’s Nigga Please, sold poorly because his increasing drug use. That’s clearly wrong: it earned a RIAA gold certification and yielded a major club hit in the Neptunes-produced “Got Your Money.” A Tale of Two Dirtys strains to show us that Dirty was a creative musician, not a holy fool. Unfortunately, A&E doesn’t do artistry. It specializes in celebrity dirt. There’s endless scenes of Dirty wandering some anonymous hallway, presumably in a drug-induced daze. Under such conditions, one doesn’t know if they should take Byronn Bain’s comment that “This country has had a love affair with Black pain and suffering since its beginning” as an ironic or a cautionary statement. A Tale of Two Dirtys was directed by Jason and Sam Pollard. Four Screens, Pulse Films, and the Ol’ Dirty Bastard Estate produced it.

Boldy James & Conductor Williams, Across the Tracks

July 4, 2024

Across the Tracks is Boldy James’ second release this year. The first, Penalty of Leadership, found the Detroit rapper collaborating with Nicolas Craven as he explored the consequences of a near-fatal car accident. The project sounded revelatory as James subtly pushed beyond his comfort zone of street pharmaceuticals and male power dynamics. Across the Tracks finds him reverting to form. He calls himself “Brick James” on “The Ol’ Switcheroo,” and claims on “Off-White Lumberjacks” that he’s “been trapping through The Wire just like Wee-Bey.” It’s an environment where “good writing” — to use an oft-abused music critic cliché — consists of illustrating a drug hustler’s lifestyle in colorful language, not thematic exposition or narrative tension. A sole example of the latter is “Flying Trapeze Act,” where James tells a story about being criminally investigated: “Tightroping in the street, this shit is death defying/When your man’s a witness in your case testifying.” Conductor Williams offers fantastic loops, as always, but it’s unclear whether James truly elevates them or simply settles into the beats like comfortable shoes. The 26-minute excursion feels too easy, like lightwork. Near Mint released Across the Tracks.

Your Old Droog, Movie

June 23, 2024

Your Old Droog’s “Movie” isn’t quite a God-tier film, but it’s a solid excursion with quality production and “nutty bars.”

MIKE, Burning Desire

November 9, 2023

Brooklyn rapper Michael “MIKE” Bonema is a prolific performer — this is his second 2023 project following Faith Is a Rock, a collaboration with Wiki and The Alchemist highlighted by the standout single “Mayors a Cop.” His tics have grown familiar, from his muddy, baritone flow and viscous diction to self-produced lo-fi loops, making it difficult to differentiate between his sundry projects. Burning Desire has a handful of WTF moments that abruptly shift the usual gears, particularly “African Sex Freak Fantasy,” a number produced by North Carolina musician Gawd that’s larded with distorted bass. Mostly, though, MIKE sticks to a well-established formula. Some of his beats are quite nice and buttery, like when he slows-and-chops Mary J. Blige’s “Real Love” on “Real Love,” and ends “They Don’t Stop in the Rain” with the Notorious B.I.G.’s chorus on “Crush on You.” His raps have a punched-in quality, a volley of bars that usually last around a minute or so, followed by a refrain to tie them together. (He compares his style to “a Sistine” on “Sixteens.”) The technique, so common among rappers in the 2020s, yields some standout lines, like when he raps, “I couldn’t cope with my feelings like Romeo” on “Snake Charm,” which is produced by Laron. Near the final third of Burning Desire, MIKE invites Lila Ramani of Brooklyn band Crumb to sing solo on “Should Be!” The haunting number feels like a palate cleanser and leads to one of the album’s strongest cuts, “What You Say You Are.” As MIKE raps, “I’m Michael Myers with the dreads,” he invokes the best aspects of his persona: A hungry striver full of Brooklyn swagger, trembling from the city’s elements and overeager to share his troubles. Not coincidentally, “What You Say You Are” lasts over three minutes and feels like a hearty dish instead of the minute-long nibbles that define so much of Burning Desire. The guests include Earl Sweatshirt and Larry June — both of whom deliver solid cameos — as well as British musicians Klein, Venna, and Mark William Lewis; experimental vocalist Liv.e, rappers Niontay and El Cousteau, and others. The evocative album art was illustrated by Ghanaian movie-poster veteran D.A. Jasper. MIKE released Burning Desire on his 10k label. * (Recommended)

Shabazz Palaces, Robed in Rareness

November 8, 2023

“All I want to do is see the girls get a chance/All I want to do is see the bros getting bands,” chants Ishmael Butler on the chorus for “Binoculars.” To that end, the Seattle rapper and bandleader stocks the 24-minute Robed in Rareness with younger prospects of varying experience, from relative unknowns like Royce the Choice and O FINESS to his son and melodic rap veteran Lil Tracy. None of them add much. Instead, the project’s success hinges on Butler’s bejeweled production, which weds electronic funk with spooky, spacey tones. Only “Gel Bait,” which sports an appearance from Geechi Suede of Camp Lo, brings much needed vocal aggression as the two complain about sundry opps and haters. This is Butler’s second major project this year, following an enigmatic outing as Lavarr the Starr on Illusions Ago. That excursion turned Butler into a singer, a shift he has toyed with since Shabazz Palaces’ excellent 2017 single “Shine a Light.” By contrast, Robed in Rareness feels a bit slighter although it closes nicely with “Hustle Crossers.” “Take me away from here,” he pleads in a melodic voice. “I’m lost in a dream.” Rapper/singer Porter Ray appears on “P Kicking G.” Robed in Rareness was released on Sub Pop Records.

Welcome to Rap City

October 15, 2023

Welcome to Rap City explores the history of the much-missed video program with not enough vintage clips and too many talking heads.