“Hardcore G-Shit, Homie I don’t play around”
That’s the first thing
you hear on Killer Mike’s new record, and it sets the tone for a powerful
record. The track that houses it, ‘Big
Beast’, is indeed hardcore, and showcases not only Killer Mike, but also down
south legends Bun B and T.I.
The industrially
heavy, old-school influenced production, for the whole album, comes courtesy of
90’s rap stalwart El-P, late of Company Flow and more recently the go-to guy
for no-compromise straight up Hip-Hop bangers.
Each track is tied to every other track in some way, with each production containing elements heard
on other tracks. This maintains the
albums coherence and thematic structure, but it never feels repetitive or overdone. There is enough variance in style to keep the
listener engaged.
‘Southern Fried’ could
be a straight up east coast boom-bap track, but the southern blues guitar
sample is cut up in such a way that it gets both crunk and gangsta without
sounding inauthentic.
The concussive
production sets an aggressively loud sonic template, but vocally Mike’s
resonant roar is up to the challenge. His
rousing growl has always allowed him to sermonize on the microphone, but here
he also channels his own fears and stories to give his tales an additional
emotional heft.
He also shows a
steeped reverence for the Hip-Hop history.
Vocally he recalls Big Boi on a couple of tracks, throws out references
Ice Cube and NWA, and drops stories like Slick Rick. I’m not sure whether it was the production
that steered him this way, but I think whatever music he had to work with
would’ve had been inspired by the legends of the game.
Family also plays a
big part on the record, with verses dedicated to his girlfriend, and a stellar
song about his grandfather called ‘Willie Burke Sherwood’. The stand-out track, if there is one, is the
fiery ‘Reagan’, which takes the former president to task for his war on drugs,
a move which put more young black men in jail instead of getting drugs off the
streets.
It’s hard to think of
an album in the last ten years that’s as angry as it is enjoyable, as
thoughtful as it is referential. It’s a
cross-continental classic, an urban connection that bridges the gritty frustration of New York City with the introspective
funk of Atlanta .
'Big Beast'
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