Tag: hip-hop

There are no label-friendly singles on this album, no Do You Want More?-style heady jazz, none of the late 90s neo-soul vibe. The mood of Roots albums had been growing steadily darker over the years, and Rising Down is the apotheosis of grime. That’s a good thing. It’s not easy to grab listeners with an…

K’naan hasn’t released an album in thirteen years, and that’s only if we’re counting 2012’s mediocre Country, God or the Girl. But the Somalian-Canadian MC’s first two albums, The Dusty Foot Philosopher and Troubadour, had the potential to take mainstream hip-hop into thrilling, borderless territory. K’naan’s art has an emotional center: his experience of fleeing…

I hated my nose growing up. It was too big, too bulbous. I wanted a white nose: Roman, aquiline. The insecurity grew milder as I got older, but it wasn’t until I saw the album cover for Black on Both Sides, and then listened to the music, that I understood how thoroughly I’d been brainwashed.…

RTJ4 dropped a week after George Floyd’s murder and a few months after COVID-19 hit the world stage. In retrospect, the most painful aspect of 2020 wasn’t the horrific events themselves. It’s the blinding realization that the world is just the same as it was before. No major legislation addressing police brutality passed; no overdue…