My Album Of The Week for the week of July 8th-July 13th, 2013:
Run The Jewels - Run The Jewels
For those who have somehow escaped this album, Run The Jewels is a collaborative album between El-P and Killer Mike. It was released on Fool's Gold Records and is free to download at their site.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't mildly obsessed with El-P's music. Nobody does the paranoia/fear of the modern world thing better than him, harnessing equal parts fear, anger, and, in his darkest moments, resignation. I've been on the bandwagon ever since 2007's I'll Sleep When You're Dead, a modern masterpiece of post-9/11 America. When he returned for a proper follow-up in 2012 with Cancer 4 Cure I joked that even though it had been five years I was still busy traveling down the wormholes of ISWYD.
(Sidenote: Super props to El-P for repping for the ginger set all these years!)
Arriving the same week as Cancer 4 Cure was Killer Mike's R.A.P. Music, which was produced entirely by El-P. Now, like most 30-something white dudes, my knowledge of Killer Mike was pretty much limited to his verse on Outkast's "The Whole World" and nothing more. Still, if El-P was behind the boards I couldn't help but give the record some time.
Now, obviously, we can probably all agree that R.A.P. Music is one of the great hip-hop records of the last 5 years. The collision of El-P's dense, jittery, NYC beats and Mike's Atlanta-bred, righteous southern flow turned out to be a perfect match.
I remember playing the title track "R.A.P. Music" on the podcast near the end of 2012 and I came to the conclusion that, while a fantastic album, it would be difficult to replicate due to the surprise factor of the unlikely pairing. Turns out I didn't have to wait too long to find out, as last week Run The Jewels turned up. While it's difficult to consider this a proper album since, even by their own admission, the idea was for El & Mike to get together and make music that they wanted to make without any sort of commercial agenda. Still, these guys are pros about their craft and even a tossed-off, free album is going to be worth digging into with both hands. Should be a fun week.
