Caltrops - No Stairway to Heaven





	[quote name="Horrible Gelatinous Blob"]<strong>Magna Carta Holy Grail</strong>: When this first leaked, a lot of people (including me) were dismissive of it. Lazy Jay is borderline unlistenable Jay, and while his rhymes here are better than The Blueprint 3, they don't even reach Watch The Throne levels, much less American Gangster. But I've been reappraising it lately and I think it took a lot of unfair criticism: yeah, there are a lot of problems with this album, but they're the same problems that have plagued Jay since he came back. Either way, many of the beats and hooks are so strong that it'll be fueling mixtapes for years to come and like I said, he's not <i>offensively</i> lazy here. An argument could be made that no one else could pull off "Tom Ford" the way he does. Then Beyonce shows up on the second half, the club-pandering single "BBC" shows up, and it all goes to shit. It's not entirely Jay's fault. He lived long enough to see himself become the villain in a musical genre that worships, elevates, and celebrates youth unlike any other. He did it by carving out a niche that had never worked for anyone else previously, and it granted him access to a wider cultural relevance, but it cost him his base. Are nineteen and twenty year olds really invested in the new Jay Z album? Can he offer anything new, anything novel, anything they can't hear done better thirteen years ago? Instead of creating trends, Jay is chasing them now. And in hip-hop, chasing trends leads but to the grave. [youtube id="ml00Nrq8yII"] <strong>Yeezus</strong>: It's weird how my stance on Kanye has softened over the years; the arrogance and childishness that used to set my teeth on edge I now find mildly endearing. Part of that is that he's pretty much always delivered enjoyable albums, part of it is that white people's hatred of him is approaching Obama levels, part of it is that unlike Jay, Kanye is still invested in challenging himself musically and pushing up against the borders of his various influences. Like <i>MCHG</i>, <i>Yeezus</i> exhibits familiar flaws, but where <i>MCHG</i> feels like a retread of a retread, <i>Yeezus</i> channels something resembling actual emotion and investment to provide heft to its rough, unfinished edges. Kanye's always been a better producer than a rapper, but the industrial-ish leanings of this album suit his flow and rhythm far better than any of his previous albums. "Black Skinhead" is the track that's gained traction, but I think "New Slaves" is the best track on the album. It's the same things that have been bothering Kanye enough to rap about since <i>MBDTF</i>: the inhumanity of the entertainment-industrial complex, the lack of compassion audiences have for performers, the institutionalized racism that money and fame can't protect him from, but here they're crystallized into their purest, most direct, most effective form. Where Jay is airy, inattentive, and phoning it in, Kanye is fully engaged at all times, for better or for worse. [youtube id="dT3swdCJrrg"] <strong>SAAAB STORIES</strong>: Action Bronson has been the darling of internet rap nerds for a few years now. He's put out a bunch of mixtapes, an album, and now he's got an EP out that's produced by Harry Fraud. Action Bronson's original claim to fame stemmed from the fact that the motherfucker sounds EXACTLY LIKE Ghostface Killah, right down to his use of obtuse metaphors and impenetrable personal slang. You can ask Shyne what sounding exactly like a beloved rap icon will get you in the absence of any compelling ideas of one's own, though. Thankfully, Action Bronson has a distinct background (which includes his former career as a sous chef) and that <i>je ne sais quoi</i> often referred to as "hunger," meaning that listening to Action Bronson rhyme is unlike listening to anyone else out there today. My favorite thing Action Bronson has done so far was <i>Well Done</i> with Statik Selectah, followed by <i>Rare Chandeliers</i> with the Alchemist. Harry Fraud isn't Statik Selectah, and he damn sure isn't the Alchemist. "Strictly 4 My Jeeps" is far and away the best thing on the EP, to the point where it sounds like the other songs were recorded as afterthoughts and the need to pad out a single to a full release. The second best track, "The Rockers," has Wiz Khalifa on it, just in case you weren't sure just how far Harry Fraud was willing to pander. SAAAB STORIES isn't a good entry point into Action Bronson, but if you're a fan, it's worth listening to on Spotify. [youtube id="yfP7qK0khuQ"] <strong>Run the Jewels</strong>: El-P and Killer Mike join forces for 33 unfuckwithable minutes. Killer Mike remains as tight and focused as he was on <i>R.A.P. Music</i> (also produced by El-P) and El-P dials down the paranoid rantings and emo reflections long enough to figure out a way to mold his flow to the beat. Subject matter includes: robbing people, shooting people's lapdogs right in front of them when said people don't cooperate with being robbed, having sex with strippers on shrooms, the inadequacy of fuck boys, the failure of fuck boys' mothers in raising fuck boys, the beats being so amazing that priests pause from cocksucking long enough to hum along, fucking rappers' lives up like Mo'Nique fucked up Precious' life, telling your side bitch not to fuck with you when your main bitch (who looks like Pam Grier in <i>Coffy</i>) is in town, tonguing girls' hot pockets and making love to their booty holes, dying on your feet, and other assorted real bad guy shit. Basically everything that makes rap and hip-hop superior to every other musical art form on earth. You need to <a href="http://www.foolsgoldrecs.com/runthejewels/">cop this</a> is what I'm saying. [youtube id="9Bzrj2mtAC4"][/quote]