Shortly after finishing the recording of the album, in April 2010, Hell Razah suffers a brain aneurysm and ends up in hospital. The rapper survives and in the following September is released this effort composed by seventeen tracks. The production is provided by the Wu-Elements Mathematics, 4th Disciple and Bronze Nazareth, along with Kevlaar 7 of Wisemen, Jordan River Banks, Havoc of Mobb Deep, Ayatollah, Dev 1, St. Peter, Shroom, Blastah Beatz and Rainmayqha. The guests are Timbo King of Royal Fam, Darnell McClain, Shabazz the Disciple who together with him form T.H.U.G. Angelz and RA the Rugged Man, for the follow-up to his underground hit "Renaissance".
Hell Razah's sixth studio album, his fourth as a soloist, is masked by a kind of concept explained in the introductory cut of the project, where the artist claims to have evolved artistically and transformed from his more earthly side, namely Hell Razah, on a more spiritual side, Heaven Razah, the name from which he takes the title of his new album. Here, the Red Hook emcee stays in his comfort zone and creates a project that thoughtfully navigates the rough and disordered seas of the flow of consciousness, delivering cryptic battle raps full of biblical and religious references, ancient history, Egyptian history, mysticism, metaphysics, spirituality, all mixed with braggadocio, socio-conscious extracts, varied gangsterisms, political extracts, complaints about the state of hip-hop today, random rants against the government and government institutions, and sprinkling various references to pop culture, institutional personalities, other artists and also paying homage to various blaxploitation films of the seventies, delivering controversial and curious lines with a slow and effortless rapping style.
On one of the best productions he has ever had so far, with a set of always fresh, amazing and different rhythms, the emcee of Sunz of Man provides some of his most inspired performances ever and the result is an album that somehow works, although I honestly don't know how. "Kids in the Street" is chosen as the unique single of the project. The producers do a job that isn't praised enough and guests also make their appearances noteworthy, so much so that the album suffers a bit at the beginning, when the interpreter covers the first twenty minutes alone before welcoming his friend RA the Rugged Man with open arms, who gives him another career highlight ("Return of the Renaissance"; the others are the prequel "Renaissance 2.0" featured in Razah's "Renaissance Child" and "Posse Cut" from R.A. the Rugged Man's collection "Legendary Classics Volume 1") "bringing it back real" — whatever it means — with a heavy and powerful anti-establishment and anti-government verse denouncing the government's control over citizens, providing an anthology-worthy contribution. Timbo King ("Heaven on Earth") and Shabazz the Disciple ("A Brooklyn Tale") are also noteworthy, especially the latter: this song in particular shows us that when Razah recorded it he was still on good terms with Bazz, so much so that he shouted the name of their duo THUG Angelz at the beginning of the song. This is probably their last track recorded together or one of the last.
As a note at the end, it's impossible not to dwell on the cover of this LP: the protagonist stands on top of hell, with his back to heaven with angels and doves around him, while he addresses the audience with what has every impression of being a "wrong fascist salute", being done with the left hand. Given the controversy, the salute is subsequently removed and the artist finds himself with his hands joined behind the same cover, even if now there are so many that it's not easy to understand which is official and which isn't. 7/10.
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