#NerdSwag [Reviews]: HRSMN / Swollen Members / Ab-Soul

After a long wait, #NerdSwag is back in full effect. We have a lot of new hip-hop dishes to clean, so let’s just get right on down to it.

(jump to):
-Swollen Members (Brand New Day)
-Ab-Soul (These Days…)

When it comes to hip-hop Supergroups, quite obviously you think of Wu-Tang. But those dudes grew up together. Rather, a Supergroup is more or less a “Miami Heat”: Any # of various — likely successful — artists forming together to create music that was otherwise once unfathomable.

The HRSMN (also known as The Four Horsemen) are one of those groups. When it comes to talent, raw lyrical skill, the HRSMN are basically Slaughterhouse without the co-sign of Eminem. If Bruno Mars did a song with Ras Kass, Canibus (yup, that dood who once hung with Wyclef and rap-battled LL Cool J), Kurupt (from Tha Dogg Pound), and Killah Priest (himself a Wu-Tang affiliate), you can bet Aunt Betty’s hot mustard that more than just a few thousand White Knights hiding behind their computer would know of the HRSMN.

Thing is, even hip-hop journalists such as your Monsignor have a hard time trying to capture the 4-1-1 on this super-talented crew. Are they together? Are they even a group? Or are they merely a project? What are their relationships?

Despite those rather trivial pursuits, what we do know is that every other year or so this fantastic foursome drops a track to get plenty of heads stirrin’. Hell, it was enough to get GHG to review an EP that isn’t exactly official. Historic serves more like a compilation of the crew’s more recent recent cuts (spanning the last 4-years), offered now as a bonus for purchasing the new Canibus album Fait Accompli on iTunes.

The title track provides the supercrew’s most accessible hook to date — as typically, HRSMN’s lengthy jawns don’t have hooks at all — and everyone gets their chance to fire their own #NerdSwag to the fullest, especially Ras Kass: “Larynx still transform like Megatron / I rise out the sea like Poseidon ridin’ Megalodon…”

Geek references and religious references?!!?

There’s a reason why C-Arson’s (Carson, CA) #1 son has been a favorite of Moody’s for as long as he was allowed to listen to rap. And speaking of favorite emcees, that’s not Nas you’re hearing on the second verse but close; it’s another Queensbridge legend, Tragedy Khadafi, who’s an easy fit with the track’s rattling strings and stirring percussion.

The next track, “Impossible”, is from FOUR years ago. With some intense horn loops, it’s a showcase of many raw verses, including some of that raspy nastiness from Canibus (“Sky watches record the speech of the jaguar priest / Rain wizards who control the rainforest beast / Bars, give me more of them, the mad warrior, Ad nauseam”) and that Book of Revelation flow of the Most High Killah Priest: “I come with GOD’s ability, and GOD’s names / GOD’s agility to witness GOD’s reign / From GOD’s throne, I spit dark flames / Light up the candle and blow out your brains.”

The above vid is a classic off Ras’ A.D.I.D.A.S. double album from 2010, to which I’d argue — with its apocalyptic/biblical visual content — is one of the most GHG-esque hip-hop videos ever; where as “Inner G” (from KP’s The Offering) offers sizable geektastic metaphors: “The Priest run through MC’s like I’m trampling ants / Peep the form it’s the Vatican stance / The Pope victor the 1st the flow spit with the curse / The sicker the verse the more bodies we stick in the dirt”…..”Slowly chose the dark side for ice cold 40s / Like Obi Wan Kenobi with an iced-out rollie”…..Walk over dead bodies like Rise of the Machines / Don’t be surprised nigga, it’s Idi Amin / Rappers get ate up like the number on Kobe’s jersey / Godammit I pop the clergy“.

Ending the EP, before the inclusion of the instrumentals, is the Best Coast triumvirate of Kurupt (“Heaven’s got a gapin’ hole, the Souls are Mischief”), Ras (“I’m going on tour in Mordor / With an elf queen for more whores”), and Crooked-I (from the aforementioned supergroup Slaughterhouse) on “3 the Hard Way”. But before I go, let’s talk about something a little more updated, as Mr. Soul on Ice has a New “Horsemen” of his own…

Yeah. There was no way this Clergy of Cool could let a track entitled “Godz N The Hood” slip by. While surely less “geek” with the content and less “apocalyptic” with the biblical metaphors, it’s a burner that should raise your spirits just a little– and there’s not too much music (this side of The Roots or Common) you can say that about. While everyone from former Aftermath heat-seaker Bishop Lamont to Ras to even the video’s director MK Asante over the orchestral synths and familiar vocal sample, it should come as no surprise that the living legend Talib Kweli face-palms the rest of the industry with a few lines of his own: “People’s perception is their lethal weapon / You can lead the rebel to the revolution / But you can’t make him do the shooting.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can cop “Godz N The Hood” & more from Ras Kass’ Barmageddon right here and/or cop the HRSMN EP Historic in a Super Deluxe Edition with Canibus’ Fait Accompli right here now on iTunes.

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Historically, there hasn’t been a hip-hop group closer to the realms of GodHatesGeeks than Swollen Members. Filled with a plethora of heroic Asgardian and Star Wars references, the Canadian hip-hop trio’s (with producer Rob the Viking) first four albums — Balance, Bad Dreams, Monsters in the Closet, and Heavy — were on Battle-Axe Records before moving onto Suburban Noize in 2009.

Well, guess what people? It’s time to party like it’s 19-99 all over again, because Swollen’s latest album brings them back to the place where it all started a solid 15-years later. Even the intro features those crackling piano keys and action movie samples the hardcore underground hip-hop fans have cherished from back in the day.

Therein, lies the struggle. Do we stick to all of the medieval topics — wizards, warriors, and warlords — that have made Swollen far more unique than the typical “get money and hoes” type hip-hop spread across the genre, or do we try to appeal to the mainstream? 

With track titles such as “Nemesis”, “Angel of Death”, “Odd Goblins” and “Creatures of Evil,” it’s fairly easy to see which direction these cats are moving, or more apropos, sticking to. With “Blood Sport”, both Prevail (“Confusing me is an illusionary tactic used by passive folks / That’s why I use these massive volts / To flow through bolts like Frankenstein / He’s alive, P’s arrived so your old flow is asinine”) and Mad Child (“Calculated strategies, maniac that’s homicidal / Bomber, suicidal with my hand up on the bible / Lungs made of gas tank, tongue is a stiletto blade / Young Frankenstein, brain is covered with the metal plate”) get all Penny Dreadful on that ass over a piano-marching, horn-driven head-nodder.

Of course, Brand New Day offers a lot more concepts than mere lyrical Game of Thrones. Rob provides a bizarre backdrop of random haunted vocals and horn descents for Mad Child’s Mad Raps on “Cock Blocker,” a track that, sure, isn’t the smoothest to listen to in the whip but nonetheless a soon-to-be-favorite at live shows. “Park Bench” is also the album’s most personal/biographical, while another pair of knockers come courtesy of scratches and co-production of DJ Revolution.

Starry keys, high-hats, and intergalactic flows take listeners through a “Supernova” (“Standing out like I’m an orange Storm Trooper… Had to kill my old self but I was torn, Looper”); and “Jacques Cousteau” sees Prevail destroy nerds with that cosmic panel-to-rhyme flow: “Trinium isotopes / Hydrogen chambers on explode mode, let em blow / Adamantium, vibranium – Marvel at my universe / Scapel competition brains so you can see how stupid works”.

Damn Geeks! Are you not satisfied?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Swollen Members’ Brand New Day in stores now courtesy Battle Axe Records.

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“I’m biblical with this shit / The tales from the Crip, on the soul of Sunday schools finna flip.”

All you gotta do is take a look at that damn cover to the left, and you’d understand why the Carson emcee might, “say fuck a GodHatesGeeks; GodHatesEmcees, man!”

There’s no surprise that These Days… — the third album (and first mainstream) from TDE emcee Ab-Soul — is one of the year’s most anticipated records. After hearing the dopeness of Oxymoron from Ab’s TDE-labelmate, ScHoolboy Q, earlier in the year, one can’t blame heads for wanting more. This is the crew that changed the hip-hop game with a guy named Kendrick, anyway.

There are some major differences between Ab and his Black Hippy brethren. First off, is the production. While still packing that mainstream flair of booming basslines, sonic synths and lighter drums, there’s not one track on the album that stands out. For some, that may be a good thing; that means there’s nothing really to skip. The other issue with These Days is the overabundance of guest emcees. While I love Mac Miller, Lupe Fiasco, Joey Bad@$$, Action Bronson and, hell, even Rick Ross on occasion, this Monsignor would have been satisfied with little more than the spots from TDE.

The first track, “God’s Reign” does set the tone for what Ab is set out to accomplish: “Your soul sits on your third eye, Soul sits on the throne / Told you I was the third wheel, that’s three wheel motion on chrome.” It’s this mix of soul-pondering and icey trap-living that make Ab as real as it gets. You feel for this bi-metric train of thought. Where is my head at? But, yo, where is my heart at? Point in case: “Dub Sac” provides both references to Tekken and sexy women.

While I could have done without the filler of “Closure”, “Sapiosexual”, and “Twact” — to which its cheeseball quality would be a far better fit for Soulja Boy – Ab-Soul continues his GHE #NerdSwaggery on “Stigmata”. Using a sample from Nas’ God’s Son, Ab sheds on his shades-in-the-night style: “I’m never in the dark though, my squad the brightest circle / Watch with the internet alone I enlighten the whole globe / That’s iTunes from a nigga with astigmatism / I got it from my moms, thank you Steve Jobs”.

Of course, this wouldn’t be TDE without an appearance from the Lebron of Hip-Hop (oh, that doesn’t mean he’s actively searching for another team, tho!), on the originally-titled “Kendrick Lamar‘s Interlude”, which recalls the jazzy sonic soundscapes of  “Ab-Soul’s Outro” from KL’s Section.80. Crazier, Ab-Soul’s favorite song of all-time is also song he recorded while on acid, which, according to Ab was “like riding a roller coaster while attempting to stand perfectly still”. It’s not like his lyrics from “Ride Slow” can argue: “Lord do you have mercy on my soul? / Far as I know I’m a poet or in an apostle / Smoking my dro, smell the aroma on my clothes / Rose from the dirt, so I’m down to Earth…”

While it’s apparent Ab-Soul’s extracurricular activities have taken his mind to the promised land time and time again, it’d be nice to see what the emcee can do with a tighter-knit package. How would the often abstract, sometimes accessible emcee fair over nine-to-ten 3-4-minute tracks of the more high profile or boom ‘n bap? My guess is we’ll never know. Ab-Soul is one of those “one of a kind” kids who’s gonna do wherever those trips take ‘em. While not everything is musically coherent, and not everything may come off so-to-speak traditional, Ab lives by many terms — with “I ain’t suicidal, I’m just fly”  only one of them — and there’s no one out there to convince him otherwise.

Who’s God with no us?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ab-Soul’s These Days… via Top Dawg Entertainment can be found wherever G.O.D. music is sold.