from The Huffington Post:
I'm absolutely not a music critic. Absolutely not. I'm a film person who loves music. I've directed four music docs, two about hip hop. Still I have no real appropriate skills for what I'm about to do, which is write about an album. With that said, I'm inspired by this beautiful thing entitled Watch the Throne and I must jot something down. However amateur.
It's past 1 a.m. and I've now listened to Watch the Throne four full times, with very necessary repeats of my new personal anthem "Murder to Excellence." Actually, "listened" might not be the right word. Bumped. Bumped is a word that'll be appreciated by patrons of the new Huffington Post Black Voices, right? We can speak freely here, right?
So if I submit that this thing -- Watch the Throne -- is a Black Nationalist Masterpiece for the New Millenium. Too Much? Because that's how I feel right now. That's what I hear. I hear Black Rich Militance, in the best definition of such a term. I hear the audacity of black gazillionaires saying wonderfully black things like, "I arrived/When Fred Hampton died." Whaa-at?! You did? Okay. Damn.
Catch the rest of the article here.
Without a doubt this is the most anticipated hip hop album of the year, and for good reason. Everyone has been wondering what Jay and 'Ye cooked up in their self-imposed recording exile. Many reports put them in Hawaii and Australia for large chunks of the recording process, cutting themselves off from much of the world. That level of obsessive dedication to secrecy and isolation always leads to intrigue and speculation, especially with artists at this level of visibility.
One thing I can give you for certain: I think they should have waited until the fall to release this record. It simply doesn't work as a summertime album for me.
But I will expand on that in the full review later in the week.
peace.
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