Sometimes at night, especially when I have things on my mind, I like to set aside time just for listening to music. I lay myself down in a darkened room just before bed and listen through headphones to an album in its entirety. The past few nights I’ve found myself returning to the same two albums: J Dilla’s Donuts, a new purchase that has hit me immediately, and Prefuse 73’s One Word Extinguisher, an album from my collection I’ve neglected for far too long.
The two are linked stylistically, both working as complete works as opposed to collections of disparate songs. I don’t want to go into back-stories too much but it is obvious that these two albums were pieced together with the utmost care. Donuts, particularly, runs like one long song. Now, I don’t claim to be the most knowledgeable when it comes to hip-hop – in fact it is the main genre where subserviently I seek recommendations – but these two make a progressive impact that I cannot ignore. Approaching some sort of post-modern urban terrorism, each album relies heavily on samples – vocal snippets, chopped up instruments, glitchy beats – but the heart remains in traditional hip-hop. The results haven’t changed so much as the methods. Much could be said of today’s shorter attention spans but in cases like these we have an intriguing statement for the value of unrest in the digital age.
I’ve been sleeping well, baby. Enough said.
[No, I’m not going to post mp3s because that would do both artists an injustice]
BUY J Dilla - Donuts BUY
BUY Prefuse 73 - One Word Extinguisher BUY
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In other news I have a couple of reviews up on Mess + Noise.
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