After a three-year hiatus, his longest since releasing an album, Killah Priest returned to solo material in 2013 with a massive and impressive double CD.
The Godz Wrath Productions team is the project's primary producers, with Jordan River Banks and Ciph Barker providing a third of the beats. Group members MOD the Black Marvel and Beat Butcha are also credited, and the group itself is credited on one beat. The music is rounded out by RZA, GZA, 4th Disciple, True Master, Kalisto, Purpose, St. Peter, Ayatollah, Agallah the Don, Shaolin Monks, Mercilles, and Federico Cisik Lopez. Guests include Ghostface Killah, Inspectah Deck, and Raekwon from Wu-Tang, George Clinton, Lord Fury, and Alita Dupray.
In these two and a half hours of listening, Killah Priest carries everything himself, carrying the double album on his own. There aren't many guest appearances to accompany him on the journey, and the author can vary lyrically, offering reflections on life, social commentary, street wisdom, violence, mysticism, thugging, religious, historical, philosophical, metaphysical themes, street rap, political and socio-conscious excerpts, and bravado, often mixed together in abstract battles that are very difficult for the casual listener to understand and assimilate.
It's clearly inspired by GZA, but his lyrics are even more complex, and to unravel them requires a deep knowledge of numerous different topics, including ancient history, biblical passages, and various sciences, among others. In these forty-plus tracks, he once again reveals himself as a profound and highly complex lyricist who makes his verses and rhymes the cornerstone of his music, often leaving rhythms in the background or simply as accompaniment to his lyrics, and delivering them with a rapping style that is praised by fans and overlooked by critics. His flow is excellent, smooth, clean, and overwhelming. The production, crafted by Godz Wrath, is excellent, brimming with calm, spacey, serene rhythms, at times experimental, psychedelic, or whimsical, which perfectly adapt to the artist's performance.
Recorded over four years between 2009 and 2012, released by Proverbs Records, it comprises two CDs, 41 tracks, and just under 140 minutes of material. The resulting album is highly ambitious, harking back to the now long tradition of double albums in hip-hop, which have often been unsuccessful. It's solid, very solid, featuring strong tracks throughout and a few scattered masterpieces, with no weak tracks, but no strings of classics either. Wu-Tang's guest appearances add valute to an already powerful double LP. For Killah Priest fans, the entire project is a masterpiece, one of his best works and obviously one of the best albums of the season, which also marked his rise to prominence as one of the greatest artists in history, inaugurating a long string of quality albums from the author. For critics, it's an average rap disk, and for casual listeners, it's inaccessible. And perhaps everyone's right. Personally, it's fantastic and certainly one of the must-listeners of the year.
Rating: 8.5/10.
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