Ghostface Killah, Apollo Kids
Def Jam

Ghostface Killah treads familiar ground on Apollo Kids, offering few if any hooks or choruses, long-winded sixteen-bar verses that could double as freestyles, and crusty soul loops as an accompaniment. Even the title pays homage to a single from his classic Supreme Clientele. He’s capable of more sophisticated stuff, as fans of past peaks like Fishscale will attest. To spice things up, Ghost recruits street-hop stars like Joell Ortiz, Busta Rhymes, Jim Jones and various Wu-Tang affiliates. Highlights include “Troublemakers,” “Street Bullies” and “Starkology.”

Rick Ross, Teflon Don
Def Jam

Rick Ross is known for farcical claims – remember when he said he knew Manuel Noriega on his breakthrough hit “Hustlin’”? For Teflon Don, he compares himself to infamous criminals Larry Hoover and Big Meech on “B.M.F. (Blowin’ Money Fast),” and on “Tears of Joy” he says he’s “Biggie Smalls in the flesh.” Lyrically, Rick Ross has improved since his mush-mouthed “Hustlin’” days, and shines amidst the best beats and guest stars money can buy. In fact, some “conscious hip-hop” fans will be disheartened that Erykah Badu, Cee-Lo, and Raphael Saddiq are just a few that gladly sold out for the almighty Teflon Don.

Big Boi, Sir Lucious Left Foot: Son of Chico Dusty
Def Jam

It’s a wonder Big Boi’s Sir Lucious Leftfoot made it to stores. Four years of untangling industry red tape has taken its toll, and its missing several early singles, including key tracks with his OutKast partner Andre 3000. What’s left of this long-delayed solo debut is very hit-or-miss. The 15-track, hour-plus album teems with guests – from Jamie Foxx and George Clinton to Janelle Monae and Yelawolf – but generates precious little synergy. However, it has enough highlights, including the futuristic funk of “Shutterbugg,” “Night Night” with B.o.B., and “Shine Blockas” with Gucci Mane, to make the wait seem worthwhile.

Nas & Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley, Distant Relatives
IDJ/Universal Republic

“This one right here is for the people,” announces Nas at the beginning of “Patience.” It’s an ethos that carries throughout Distant Relatives, his long-awaited collaboration with Damian Marley, as the two focus relentlessly on issues political and social, domestic and international. Lyrically, both are at the top of their game, even if many of the tunes – including the excellent “As We Enter” – sound more like chop sessions than full-fledged songs. The music is tasteful and complementary (if slightly bland), making this an intriguingly mature release from the Queensbridge MC and a triumphant post-Jamrock return for “Jr. Gong.”

Meth, Ghost and Rae, Wu-Massacre
Def Jam

Okay, so the thirty-minute mini-album Wu-Massacre is something of a rush job, with few developed concepts and no memorable hooks. But who cares? The Wu-Tang triumvirate sticks to what it does best and spits hardcore darts over a crackling set of soul loops. While the results aren’t revelatory, they’re thrilling all the same. Ghostface’s “Pimpin’ Chipp,” where he impersonates a hooker paying tribute to her dead pimp, is a strange highlight. Other songs, such as “Youngstown Heist” and “Criminology 2.5,” seem pockmarked with bellowed threats and blasting gun shots.

Redman, Redman Presents…Reggie
Def Jam

“Some rappers say they had it/ I feel I’m getting started,” argues Redman on his seventh album, Reggie. To prove his point, the Brick City veteran abandons the distinctive funk beats of his earlier classics in favor of electronic R&B hooks and clubby bounce tracks. It yields some rewards like “Def Jammable” and “Lite 1 Witcha Boi,” the latter a posse cut with Method Man and Bun B, as well as a few duds such as the Auto-Tuned “Full Nelson.” Reggie sounds uneven, but give Redman credit for trying something new, even at the risk of alienating his hardcore audience.

Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
Def Jam

To understand why My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy earns its title, sounds both sensuously epic and a bit of a dick joke, and manages to combine deep melancholy and triumphant hubris into a stunningly intense experience, let’s backtrack to Kanye West’s debut, 2003’s The College Dropout. On “Never Let Me Down,” Kanye multi-tracked John Legend and Tracie Spencer’s backing vocals into a full-blown gospel chorus as he ruminated on how his parents participated in lunch counter sit-ins during the civil rights movement, and how that legacy made him different. “Niggas can’t make it to ballots to choose leadership/ But we can make it to Jacob’s and to the dealership/ That’s why I hear new music and I just don’t be feeling it,” he rapped. Matched against Kanye’s earnestness, Jay-Z’s Cristal-stained boasts were woefully out of place.

Seven years later, Kanye has become another errant choir boy. His religious upbringing and Black History Month studies help him make outrageous claims of being a pharaoh, a deity similar to Allah himself. “Malcolm West had the whole nation standing at attention,” he claims on “Power.” He speaks about light-skinned girls as if they were new Bentleys to be licked and humped. (Cue R. Kelly’s “You Remind of My Jeep.”) And suddenly, Jay Hova himself sounds right at home. He murders “Monster.” Even Rick Ross, who repeats his familiar shtick of personifying big-balling hustlers on “Devil in a New Dress,” is apropos to this tall tale of adult children lost in a world of designer clothes, luxury vehicles and scantily-clad women, with TMZ and Gawker keeping score. Brilliantly, Kanye couches these fantasies in a hip-hop context. By inviting the aforementioned plus the RZA, Pusha T, Swizz Beatz, Raekwon and Kid Cudi, he demonstrates that materialism and hubris are essential to understanding hip-hop culture as it is lived, if not necessarily how Kool Herc and Afrika Bambaataa first envisioned it. As Pusha T says on “Runaway,” “I’m just young, rich and tasteless.”

Nicki Minaj shows up on “Monster” as well, and for “Dark Fantasy,” she playfully impersonating a wide-eyed British schoolgirl spouting Hogwarts cadences. Still, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is an Alpha male’s vision of social mores and sexuality. On “Blame Game,” Kanye retraces the loneliness and despair of his last album, 2008’s 808s and Heartbreak, but this time his sadness has turned to bitterness. “Been a long time since I spoke to you/ In the bathroom gripping you up, fucking and choking you,” he raps before transmuting his voice into an angry growl a la Prince’s “Bob George.” John Legend chimes in with the chorus, “I’ll call you bitch for short,” and Chris Rock ends it by impersonating the new boyfriend of Kanye’s ex, and delivers a minutes-long appreciation of Kanye’s “training” skills. Only the end of “Runaway” beats “Blame Game” in self-indulgence, thanks to Kanye collapsing his “toast for the douchebags” refrain into an Auto-Tuned crying jag. Our little “Monster” seemingly can’t handle real emotional pain. He’s much better at ogling the “American Apparel girl” in “Gorgeous.”

Kanye supports his sexist overtures with perhaps his finest rap performance to date. It’s thrilling to hear him rip through “Gorgeous” with scientific precision: “This pimp is at the top of Mount Olympus/ Ready for the world’s games, this is my Olympics/ We make ‘em say ‘ho’ because the game’s so pimpish.” But, as always, his conscience re-emerges, and he wavers. “What’s a black Beatle anyway, a fucking roach?” he asks, seemingly retreating from stadium rock greatness. Then, tellingly, he sloughs off his ambitions with another lament. “It’s been a while since I watched the tube/ ‘Cause like a Crip said, I got way too many blues for some more bad news.”

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy may be an angry and conflicted work, yet it pales next to 50 Cent at his most brutishly cutthroat, Jay-Z at his most cunningly precise, or Scarface at his most laconic and murderous. Kanye will always lose in the hardcore sweepstakes. He is doomed to play Hamlet, a prince too despondent to assume his place on the throne. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’s coda is “Lost in the World,” and it’s eerily reminiscent of Stevie Wonder’s “Another Star.” “Let’s break out of this wack-ass party and turn it into a classic night/ If we die in each other’s arms, we’ll get laid in the afterlife.” It’s not the first time Kanye brings up the subject of death; on “Power,” he ends by saying, “This would be a beautiful death/ I’m jumping out the window/ And letting everything go.”

Near its end, “Lost in the World” drifts into a lengthy excerpt from Gil Scott-Heron’s 1960s spoken-word piece “Comment #1,” re-titled here as “Who Will Survive in America?” Scott-Heron rails in bravely didactic fashion against our country’s bloody history, and our hypocrisy towards personal freedom and democratic ideals. The piece’s inclusion leads to the question of why Kanye would eschew revolutionary suicide for a career of nouveau riche celebrity and petty rituals of conspicuous consumption. But don’t we all want to be young and rich? My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy may tally the high price of fame, but most of us would gladly pay it.

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This essay was posted November 22 on the Rhapsody SoundBoard blog.

This essay on the Roots’ How I Got Over was posted July 14 on Rhapsody.com’s Music Stuff Place blog. I wrote it for my Rap Is Not Pop column.

Last week, I promised that I would abandon the concepts that have marked most of my Rap Is Not Pop entries and go deep on one album. This was my attempt. I didn’t get to mention my reservations about How I Got Over, from its meandering arena rock tone (interesting that critics called out B.o.B for that, but not the Roots — I guess it’s not what you do, but how you do it) to the way it ends, clumsily, with two tracks, “Web 20/20″ and “Hustla,” that didn’t match the rest of the album’s sound. But I’ve long since learned that it’s pointless to try and cram every thought about every track into a single critique. Better to focus on a theme, just as I would any other type of article, and give an impression of what the album sounds like. That leaves plenty of other nooks and crannies for listeners to explore.

Having said that, the essay just turned out okay. I made some writing mistakes.

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Rap Is Not Pop: The Roots’ Lost Paradise

Since 1996′s Illadelph Halflife, The Roots have explored social realism, portraying the mythical “streets” as a world of intractable crime, imminent dangers that require street smarts and split-second decisions, and blacks at risk of a high mortality rate — or, in scientific terms, a greater half-life. In some ways, Illadelph Halflife was a response to critics and fans who categorized the group as “jazz-rappers” after the brilliant 2004 1994 disc Do You Want More?!!!??! Much like Gang Starr, Digable Planets and other hip-hop acts saddled with the “acid jazz” tag, The Roots felt compelled to move in a more hardcore direction, albeit one that would continue to utilize their skills as excellent live musicians.

Illadelph Halflife also introduced another theme The Roots repeat to this day. Nineteen ninety-six was the year of De La Soul’s Stakes Is High. The East Coast-West Coast conflict, the incursion of organized gangs into the music industry, and Diddy and Dr. Dre’s commercialization of hardcore hip-hop all led rappers to portend that the music genre faced a virtual apocalypse. Now it seems silly that people actually believed authentic hip-hop culture would die just because G-funk and jiggy were so popular, but their concern felt very real back then, especially with the shooting deaths of Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. on the horizon. Nearly 15 years later, and with the recent release of their ninth full-length album, How I Got Over, The Roots still sound the alarm.

The Roots aren’t just a cracking live band or a lineup of revolving musicians anchored by drummer and producer ?uestlove and rapper and vocalist Black Thought. It’s a sprawling collective. Philly emcee Dice Raw has been featured on every album, even though he isn’t an official member, and Truck North, Peedi Crakk and P.O.R.N. have made several appearances. Roots alumni include rapper Malik B., pianist and producer Scott Storch, keyboardist Kamal Gray, neo-soul vocalists the Jazzyfatnastees, poet Ursula Rucker, underrated multi-instrumentalist and producer James Poyser, and Incubus guitarist Ben Kenney — and that’s not counting frequent guests like Common and Mos Def.

“Walk alone, walk alone, I’m always walking alone, forever since the day I was born,” sings Kirk Douglas on “Walk Alone” from How I Got Over. However, the song features Truck North, P.O.R.N., Dice Raw, and Black Thought ruminating on their solitude, with Black Thought claiming, “I walk alone like the lost boys of Sierra Leone.” Its multitude of voices suggests that we may struggle as individuals, but we are never truly alone in spirit.

It’s not the only contradiction on How I Got Over. The title itself is widely assumed to be a celebration of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential victory, but the music’s downbeat tone is more indicative of the country’s subsequent soul-searching amidst a deep recession, political divisions and foreign wars. “Corporate monopoly/ Weak world economy/ Stock market toppling/ Mad marijuana, Oxycotin, and Klonopin/ Everybody out of it,” raps Black Thought on “Dear God 2.0,” a remix of Monsters of Folk’s “Dear God” (which itself seemed to revisit XTC’s “Dear God”). “Why is the world ugly when you made it in your image?” If the Roots have gotten over, then How I Got Over focuses on the personal and political torment they strive to overcome.

With its soft, melancholy keyboards from Frank Walker and ?uestlove’s strong yet understated drumming, How I Got Over may be The Roots’ most live and analog album since 1999′s Things Fall Apart. But while Things Fall Apart sounded defiant — a sonic representation of Okonkwo from Chinua Achebe’s literary masterpiece Things Fall Apart — the world-weary How I Got Over is lost in reflections. ?uestlove has called it a meditation on impending middle age, of turning 40 and taking, as he told Vibe.com, “one hard look in the mirror.” Left unspoken in the lyrics, yet mentioned enough in the group’s earlier albums that they continue to loom over their work, are those opportunities that now seem lost to time and chance.

For many, the rap wars of 1996 changed everything. There’s an entire generation of fans who firmly believe that the genre has been lost forever. Nothing can disabuse them of this notion, not even Drake’s Thank Me Later or Nas & Damian Marley’s Distant Relatives. They hear these recordings as lucky exceptions to mainstream rap strictures — or, as Black Thoughts rhymes on “Doin’ It Again,” “The unsung, under-appreciated, the one them underachievers had underestimated” — not as proof that there is a thriving hip-hop culture in spite of commercialism. Worse, it seems as if these fans may never return and are only too happy to relegate their love for hip-hop to youthful memories.

How I Got Over is melancholy, even tinged with tragedy. But it is not defeatist. The Roots invite newer emcees like Phonte Coleman and Blu to contribute, passing the torch to a younger generation. The album argues for hip-hop’s continued relevance amidst changing mores, and proves that The Roots’ vision of hip-hop as a form of unfettered creative exploration, not just regional hood niches, is still relevant. “I’m the definition of tragedy turned to triumph,” raps Black Thought on “The Fire.”

Or, as Douglas sings on the excellent title track, “Someone has to care.”

You’ve read about it on your favorite blogs and websites. You watched the crazy teaser videos that ripped off the Brad Pitt flick Seven. You downloaded the free MP3s. Now it’s time to wipe away the drool, because the Meth, Ghost & Rae collabo album is coming out.

Set for release via Def Jam on March 30, Wu Massacre is mostly a Wu affair, with production from RZA and Allah Mathematics and guest spots from Inspectah Deck, Streetlife (Remember “PLO Style?”) and Trife. Interestingly, the Rhythm Roots Allstars, who were the backing band on many of those Scion Live mini-tours from a few years ago, and even showed up on Ghost’s The Big Doe Rehab, contribute to a few tracks.

Here’s what the label is calling the “tentative” track listing. I will update it if there are any changes.

• 1. “Criminology 2.5″
• 2. “Mef vs. Chef” (feat. Rhythm Roots Allstars)
• 3. “Ya Moms (Skit)”
• 4. “Smooth Sailing Remix” (feat. Solomon Childs & Streetlife)
• 5. “Our Dreams”
• 6. “Gunshowers” (feat. Inspectah Deck & Sun God)
• 7. “Dangerous” (feat. Rhythm Roots Allstars)
• 8. “Pimpin’ Chipp” (feat. Rhythm Roots Allstars)
• 9. “How To Pay Rent (Skit)” (feat. Tracy Morgan)
• 10. “Miranda”
• 11. “Youngstown Heist” (feat. Trife, Sheek & Bully)
• 12. “It’s That Wu Sh*t”

Next week, September 29, Ghostface Killah drops his seventh album (eighth if you include the odds-and-sods collection More Fish), Ghostdini: Wizard of Poetry in Emerald City. As widely reported, it’s an R&B affair, with appearances by an auto-tunin’ Raheem DeVaughn, John Legend, Lloyd and others. Two singles from the Def Jam release have already hit the internets: “Baby,” which has a classic 90s feel, and the raw dog “Stapleton Sex.”

After the album’s release, Ghost will hit the road for his second tour this year, following a successful run with Meth & Red last summer.

Here’s the track listing:

• 1. Not Your Average Girl (feat. Shareefa)
• 2. Do Over (feat. Raheem “Radio” DeVaughn)
• 3. Baby (feat. Raheem “Radio” DeVaughn)
• 4. Lonely (feat. Jack Knight)
• 5. Stapleton Sex
• 6. Stay
• 7. Paragraphs Of Love (feat. Vaughn Anthony & Estelle)
• 8. Guest House (feat. Fabolous & Shareefa)
• 9. Let’s Stop Playin’ (feat. John Legend)
• 10. Forever
• 11. I’ll Be That (feat. Adrienne Bailon)
• 12. Goner (feat. Lloyd)
• 13. She’s A Killah (feat. Ron Browz)
• 14. Back Like That (feat. Ne-Yo & Kanye West)

And here are the tour dates:

• 9/25: Shoe Biz, San Francisco, CA (afternoon in-store)
• 9/29: Adidas Originals, New York, NY (afternoon in-store)
• 9/30: Hiro Ballroom, New York, NY (MySpace showcase)
• 10/01: Adidas Originals, Washington, DC (afternoon in-store)
• 10/02: Northern Lights, Albany, NY (1)
• 10/03: Adidas Originals, Philadelphia, PA (afternoon in-store)
• 10/03: Trocadero, Philadelphia, PA (1)
• 10/04: Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro, NC (1)
• 10/05: Music Farm, Charleston, SC (1)
• 10/07: Revolution, Ft. Lauderdale, FL (1)
• 10/09: Lyrics, Oxford, MS (1)
• 10/10: Spanish Moon, Baton Rouge, LA (1)
• 10/11: Emo’s, Austin, TX (1)
• 10/13: The Rock, Tucson, AZ (1) (2)
• 10/14: Clubhouse, Tempe, AZ (1) (2)
• 10/15: Canes, San Diego, CA (1) (2)
• 10/16: Key Club, Los Angeles, CA (1)
• 10/17: Velvet Jones, Santa Barbara, CA (1)
• 10/19: Club Underground, Reno, NV (1)
• 10/20: Shoe Biz, San Francisco, CA (afternoon in-store)
• 10/20: Slim’s, San Francisco, CA (1) (3)
• 10/21: Arcata Theatre, Arcata, CA (1) (4)
• 10/22: Berbati’s Pan, Portland, OR (1)
• 10/23: Wow Hall, Eugene, OR (1)
• 10/24: Tower Theatre, Fresno, CA (1)
• 10/25: Nightlight Lounge, Bellingham, WA (1)
• 10/28: Urban Lounge, Salt Lake City, UT (1)
• 10/29: Belly Up Tavern, Aspen, CO (1)
• 10/30: Bluebird Theatre, Denver, CO (1)
• 10/31: Fox Theater, Boulder, CO (1)
• 11/02: Waiting Room, Omaha, NE (1)
• 11/03: Barrymore, Madison, WI (1)
• 11/04: House of Blues, Chicago, IL (1)
• 11/07: Skully’s, Columbus, OH (1)
• 11/08: Bluebird, Bloomington, IN (1) (5)
• 11/09: Blind Pig, Ann Arbor, MI (1) (5)
• 11/11: BB King’s, New York, NY (1) (5)
• 11/12: Westcott Theatre, Syracuse, NY (1) (5)
• 11/13: Paradise Lounge, Boston, MA (1)
• 11/14: Asylum, Portland, ME (1)

(1) w/Fashawn
(2) w/Mayer Hawthorne
(3) w/Souls of Mischief, Strong Arm Steady, Deep R.O.O.T.E.D.
(4) w/Ky-mani Marley
(5) w/Blu & Exile