History tells us that it is really difficult to make a decent group album. The larger the group, the more unlikely that you can make more than one great album, just ask Wu-Tang. If I was a white girl in college this is the kind of hip-hop I would be into. People used to call this backpacker music, emo-rap, I don’t know what they call it now: blog rap? What people definitely do not call this is a great album.

Yes, the members of Doomtree can still rap really well. Dessa, the group’s female member is featured on almost every hook, and her verses are some of the albums strongest. The marketing, and presentation of All Hands focuses on Dessa because that is what anyone who sees, or hears Doomtree for the first time will remember: “Oh, yeah that hip hop group with the girl in it.” Most of the members verses are solid, well above average. Some of the beats are masterful, but overall this album doesn’t have the infectious grooves to garner repeat listens. Maybe the clever lines will serve long-time fans well enough:

My name is Sims but call me David Lynch, I make em act funny/
I ain’t afraid to change lines, state, date, or face/
I’m option two when you skate or die but still survive on basslines/
At least for the next eight months/
Then I change up like it ain’t much/ – “Grey Duck”

Every track seems a bit too well polished, and formulaic in structure (see “Mini Brute”), as if Doomtree was really going for that radio crossover hit, and forgot about the sound that got them here in the first place. Mic Mictlan sounds too much like an El-P clone in his tone, and delivery on the lead single, “Grey Duck”. Although, if there are more MCs in the world sounding like EL-Producto clones maybe that is part of the Def Jux founder’s twenty year plan for world domination?

All Hands lacks the tracks with the head nod quality of some previous Doomtree efforts. With the new album opting instead for a more EDM influenced sound. There are not a ton of out-and-out misses on the album, and there are a few shining moments like “.38 Airweight”, “Grey Duck”, and “Marathon”.

Perhaps what drove Doomtree in this direction was not simply an attempt to cash in on the hot sounds, but seeing the most energetic reactions at live shows for the drop heavy tracks in their repertoire. At least the production on All Hands is not all cheesy synths, or standard golden-age soul loops, but there are plenty of tired moments. On the other side at least they are trying to meld hip-hop with the sounds of this generation. In five years (or less) this will sound dated, but it does offer a snapshot of where youth music is at right now.

This feels like the moment that the Black Eyed Peas abandoned their original female member, Kim Hill, and got Fergie to broaden their pop appeal. Well it worked for B.E.P., but they were never really that underground. Doomtree on the other hand built their following through energetic live shows highlighting their gifted wordplay, and unique beats. Are their fans ready to go full retard, or full EDM? Sure, tracks like “Bangarang” from the No Kings album dabbled in the drop, but there is hardly a tune on the new album that doesn’t sound like it is built for festival fodder, maybe the next change in musical direction will lead to greener pastures for this crew from the land of 10,000 lakes.

Lupe Fiasco expounds and expands on his fifth studio album Tetsuo & Youth. Those expecting a significant dose of anime imagery hinted at the title, prepare to be disappointed. Those looking for an innovative take on hip hop, look no further. Forget the twitter beefs, dude delivers a serious album. Yes, it sounds like it could be a Kanye album in that it is grand in scope, artful in places, and the production is top-notch. What Tetsuo & Youth lacks that a Kanye album would have is at least one radio hit. The only thing keeping this from being a 5 out of 5 is the absence of that one song you will hear on your radio for months, although, maybe it is hiding in there if the world is ready for a hit like “Body of Work”. I can hear the last track “They.Resurrect.Over.New” playing in the background of sports highlights clips, but it doesn’t feel like an anthem.

Straight from jump on the nearly nine minute long “Mural,” Lupe demonstrates gifted lyrics absent of hooks just to check that the listener is ready to absorb the experience. Over the course of the album Lupe proceeds, and continues to paint pictures halfway between stream of consciousness and conscious flow. Moving between the streets and the library with an ease that most of his contemporaries struggle to find. Tetsuo & Youth is a balanced album on all levels.

“Dots & Lines”, and “Little Death” sound like the best electro-soul-funk that Outkast never made. The tracks with Chris Brown and Big K.R.I.T. that Lupe offered as a media preview to the album late last year are missing from the release. The nearly 9 minute long concept track “Prisoners 1&2” dealing with the New Jim Crow incarceration issues signals a turn for the album from jazzy to gritty. From there we go into more trap influenced production on “Body of Work”, a darker bent to the lyrics, and production, snapped back into free form jazzland at the outro on what is possibly the best track on the album, “Little Death” featuring Nikki Jean.

The posse cut “Chopper” feels a bit out of place in the mostly jazz influenced album, although the song’s funny in a sad-but-true kind of way chorus of “Filet mignon with my food stamps/ Car Co-signed by my mama/ Medical card from Obama/ Background check for a chopper” is one of the most memorable hooks on first listen.

“Chopper” offers expert analysis of the real world effects of poverty echoed in a much more comical way on the track “Deliver”. From a look at the sad reality of delivery vs. DiGiorno Tetsuo & Youth segues into the three most inventive tracks on the album: “Madonna (and other mothers in the hood)”, “Adoration of the Magi”, and “They.Resurrect.Over.New.,” tracks which you will just have to experience for yourself.

Lupe delivers an album that demands multiple listens thanks to the depth of his lyrics, the seamless melding of guests, witty lines, laugh out loud moments, and dope production from start to finish. The vocal contributions of Guy Sebastian, Nikki Jean, and others, plus the production by S1, Vohn Beatz, and DJ Dahi are as much the star of Tetsuo & Youth as Lupe’s lines. The listener gets the feeling that each track was crafted as part of a whole, creating a great album tailored to elevate Lupe past his peers with the masterwork of his career so far in Tetsuo & Youth.

The album title, Respect the Architect – borrowed from a 1995 Guru Jazzmatazz track – seems a bit forced, but luckily for the longtime fans, and new heads seeking quality over gloss, the title is the only thing that is out of place in this effort. The title and the artist demand consideration, calling to the music Blueprint so clearly loves and understands for a return to form. Another solid construction from one of underground hip-hop’s most unheralded creators. The beats are rooted in golden age, but the production still manages to sound fresh, and the samples are not played out. Blueprint’s flow is clear and concise, if not instantly recognizable, or altogether unique.

When one hears the name Blueprint the first reaction is typically something along the lines of, “Oh yeah, dude who rhymed over RJD2′s beats.” Those heads may be unaware that for the last several years Blueprint, has crafted his own beats, while RJ, for better or worse, ventured into a folk guitar grey area. On Respect the Architect, Blueprint, sticks to the plan by not experimenting too much with the beats on this one. Opting instead to stay rooted in the boom-bap that best serves his flow.

The verses on this album are delivered with vigor and insight. Venturing from braggadocio, to personally revealing, even veering into somewhat self-effacing from track to track. A varied offering with quality punchlines, and resonant themes that make this one of the best pure hip-hop albums of modern times. The few skits and guest appearances serve the pacing of the material well while elevating the work, a feat rare in this day of multiple guests on every track, and forced, uninspired collaborations.

Once the listener gets to ethereal strings at the beginning of title track respect has already been earned (if it wasn’t already there), and legendary status is within sight. Then “Perspective” sails in and we hear several stories that most aware in modern times can relate to. The beat drops out as Al starts sharing pieces of his personal history on, “Silver Lining”, and one of the most powerful intro lines: “So much more than a rapper, They only write rhyme, well I’mma writer, that uses rap to capture the times,” Followed by one of the standout verses of the last decade:

Flippin’ through the channels, landed on Charlie Rose / Interviewing Sting about all the songs he wrote / Charlie asked how a song writer keep his hope / What Sting answered, I never dare forget the quote / He said ‘the music gets dark whenever things get bad / But artist gotta understand, it’s easiest to paint with black / If you feel it comin’ on, you gotta reel it back / Cause people turn to us to hopefully escape from that….’

Congratulations and multiple listens are due Blueprint for sticking to his namesake, and erecting a meaningful, and resonant structure to an album that is worthy of all the accolades that it receives. Are people still interested in listening to hip-hop artists that actually have stories to tell? Does the smartphone generation have the strength to work through it’s collective ADD, and again elevate artists as committed to the craft as Al obviously is? Even if financial windfalls elude Blueprint, hopefully this isn’t a swan song, but rather another level, scaffolding for high-rising on the horizon.

Kid Cudi has always been a bit of an enigma. Do mainstream music fans, the ones that throw their hands in the air, and wave them carefree-like every time that “Pursuit of Happiness” or one of its million remixes comes on in the club, really get Cudi the way that Sidney Deane got Jimi? If you presented this album to the same bon vivants who so embrace the ethos and chorus of “Mr. Rager” without any information about who made this album, they may not be able to actually discern that Cudi is the same artist. As far as monotone MCs and singers go Cudi is no guru, but he is an artist. Unique, instantly recognizable, and still spitting emotive, personal and emotionally revealing (bordering on disturbed), verses even when his music penetrates the top rankin’ of the club charts.

The soundscape the Cudster creates on Satellite FLIGHT: Return to the Mother Moon may sound like a complete departure from, or a return to, his old sound depending on when you got into this Kid. In actuality it is neither. The Satellite FLIGHT mixtape/album is a flight of fancy that breaks free of the gravitational pull of planet mainstream. A force that would have restrained a more suggestible artist emboldens Cudi to stand alone, cutting his own path through the popular music landscape.

This is not supposed to be a full album, just a intermission of sorts between Indicud and whatever is coming next. There are no discernable hits on this one, the production orbits familiar popular sounds, while infusing a style and emotion distinct from the average collection of club ready bangers one might expect from someone who has had so much success in that arena. Longtime Cudi fans have been calling for a return to more of his beat driven sound, which he provides here with cues from rock and soul hinted at in the WZRD side project, more fully realized on Satellite FLIGHT.

Every time Cudi presents a new album to the world he both expands on and departs from his previous effort. This may seem contradictory until you listen to the lyrics and take the production in as a whole. Where Indicud was a collection of standard hip hop tempo, rap driven, guest heavy tracks, Satellite FLIGHT is a more personal voyage to somewhere darker. Cudi only really raps on one track, “Too Bad I have to Destroy You Now”, well sequenced at the middle of the album, serving as a reminder that the Kid can still kick it. The only guest appearance listed in Raphael Saadiq on “Balmain Jeans” and his singing in the final verse of the track is so well placed you know that this was not some forced guest appearance suggested by an A&R, but two brothers in electro soul who just wanted to work together.

Love him or hate him, you have to respect Cudi for taking chances while staying true to the themes and styles that his oldest supporters first recognized as special when they heard him years ago somewhere in that not-so-intergalactic address known as Ohio. Sit back and listen to this one and appreciate something more and more rare in the music world: an artist both talking to, and listening to, his audience, and in the process treating the world to a front row seat to his evolution.

On Place in the Sun, the eighth album from LA Latino funk collective Ozomatli, the band eschews its grittier, politically charged earlier ethos in favor of a more pop sound. While this critic has missed most of the last few Ozomatli albums, so it’s unclear if this is a completely new development, but it’s really surprising at how poppy their sound had become over the decade.

The fact that Ozomatli has been making music for this long is an accomplishment in itself and a testament to the commitment of their fan base, driven in large part by the radioactive energy of their live performance. I had a chance to see Ozomatli rock a crowd of about a thousand mostly white, middle aged beach folk down in Florida over a decade ago. Proving their chops more than any album ever could is their ability to connect with seemingly polar opposites through the diplomacy of funk. I got into Ozomatli because I was into DJing, funk music, and anything by Cut Chemist.

After only the first album their material departed from hip-hop infused beats provided by the Jurassic 5 co-founder, to the point where now the presence of the DJ is unheard on this album. That’s not good or bad, just an observation. Hopefully they still at least have a DJ in their live shows, as this was one of the major things that sparked a lot of people’s interest in them in the first place.

What’s up for debate is the quality of this record, and overall, as an album, it is bad. From a fan’s perspective, this is difficult to say, as both their live show and some of their older material is amazing. The first five tracks on this album feel like the members were trying in earnest to write the most amazing pop song for every style of music they could play. Batucada? Check. Electro? Check. Pop Rock? Check. Reggae primed for the nearest Sandals resort? Check. Slow-jam Salsa? You get the picture.

It’s clear that the members of this band are all very polished musicians by this point. The production sounds like something you would hear on a Black Eyed Peas album half of the time, and maybe a Jason Mraz album the rest. The album does get a bit better in the second half with “Burn it Down”, and “Tus Ojos”, the best song on the album. But there the goodness ends, and the songs sway too far into campy cheeseland for this critic’s tastes. I was hoping to hear something new and fresh with this album, but instead got something I may appreciate when I too own a seaworthy vessel and want to get groovy with the latin funk music. Perhaps.

Overall the new Curren$y joint The Drive-in Theatre is a solid throwback to the smoked out hip-hop albums of old, but it doesn’t feel complete. Curren$y solidifies his place in the game with solid wordplay and metaphors, while conveying the pimp and hustler southern player lifestyle through his choice of subject matter. His silky smooth flow belies vocal vigor unseen in many of the mainstream rappers who resort to shouting all of their lyrics.

Upon first listen, the quality doesn’t jump out at you, as it feels like it is missing something, but subsequent listens reveals it’s like those rap albums of old: the gangster movie samples, the calling-out incompetent MCs. Oh right, this is what hip-hop used to sound like, unconcerned with making a glossed over radio hit, just bringing the smooth flow and bangin’ beats. Overall the production is superb, nothing ground-breaking, but a reminder that a great horn sample and a competent MC can elicit more emotion that even the loudest synth laser beam and screaming.

Curren$y receives help from several guests, but none more appropriate than Dr. Greenthumb himself, B-Real. On “E.T.”, their collaboration is the dopest beat on the album, reminiscent of some old Juggaknots or Boogie Monsters. B-Real kills this verse and you hope that the Impala kid from down south is going to kick it up a notch, and he does for almost an entire verse, but then he just fizzles off like a spliff left burning in the ashtray.

The other standout tracks on the second half of the album are “El Camino” featuring Mary Gold, “Fo”, “Usual Suspects” and the bonus track. Most of the guests fail to really add anything significant, beside a different vocal timbre. Curren$y clearly has the talent to carry an entire album, hopefully next time he will.

Overall The Drive-in Theatre is a good album, and inconsistent though the tracks may be, they are leaps and bounds above the majority of what is out there right now in the form of authentic hip-hop. The one thing that is consistent is the quality of Curren$y’s flow and his ability to present the listener with an experience. The listener develops an understanding that not every song coming out of the South is made for the clubs, and that there is such a thing as a conscious hustla.

For those of you yearning for a time when the DJ’s name preceded the MC’s check out this  little video of the classic track T.R.O.Y. being performed by Pete Rock and CL Smooth live in San Diego recently at Soundwave at the Wave house. Overall this was a great show with the dynamic duo running through all their classic material, punctuated by a best of Pete Rock megamix, and the closer of course TROY.

I told some twenty two year old kids that I work with about the show and they were like “Who?” even though they are “all about hip hop”. Know the classics kids, before you claim knowledge. The sound quality is not the best, but hey, what do you want it’s the internet.

Ghosts of the Barbary Coast is another collaboration between Aesop Rock and artist Jeremy Fish, available for download from def jux right here. The art is Fish at his surreal tattoo influenced best. The track called “tomorrow morning” is pure Ace Rizzle , with the strangely catchy chorus of:

tomorrow morning when the wharf is finished warping, you will wash up on the shore and wonder what was so alluring, tomorrow evening when the leeches finish feeding, you will regret the ownership of an aorta that is bleeding

What sucks is that you have to go through the process of signing up for a user account on definitivejux.net to get the download, but I can’t fault a business for trying to collect some demographic and contact info from its customers.  Here is the link to check out the package, which includes a .mov file with images of Fish’s art set to the song, and a pdf of Aesop’s lyrics.

http://www.definitivejux.net/store/catalog-product/US-A4T-04-173-00.html

Here is the link to listen or download the RZA track “Gone”

http://live.rzawu.com/gone.html