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at a glance...
Hometown:
Davis/Sacramento, CA
Formed: 1992
Personnel:
The Gift of Gab: Rapping, writing
Chief Xcel: Music, cuts
Vincent Segel: Strings, arrangements
Harley White, Jr.: Bass
Jose Espinosa: Saxophones
Anthony Coleman: Trumpet
Anthony Ortiz: Percussion
Lateef the Truth Speaker: Rapping
Erinn Anova: Vocals
Joyo Velarde: Vocals
Gil Scott-Heron: Vocals
Chali 2na: Rapping
Keke Wyatt: Vocals
Jaguar Wright: Vocals
?uestlove: Drums
Tracey Moore: Vocals
Ben Harper: Vocals, guitar
Cut Chemist: Turntables
Rakaa Iriscience: Rapping
Babu: Cuts
Saul Williams: Poetry
Lyrics Born: Rapping
Zack de la Rocha: Vocals
In the Family :
Latryx, DJ Shadow, Jurassic 5, Dilated Peoples, Ben Harper, Gil Scott Heron, The Roots
Notes:
Timothy J. Parker was a nimble-tongued kid from SoCal; he met a music freak from the Bay Area named Xavier Mosley; they talked about hip-hop, got to be friends, and went their separate ways. They bumped into each other a few years later, and Mosley convinced Parker that the new Cali music scene was up torward Sacramento, at UC Davis. He'd hooked up with a bunch of other obsessive multicultural musical types and they were calling themselves SoleSides. By the time they'd changed the name of the collective to Quannum, the whole world knew about DJ Shadow, and independent literate hip-hop on the West Coast was starting to be transformed by Latyrx (Lateef the Truth Speaker and Lyrics Born) and the group that Mosley (now deejay Chief Xcel) and Parker (a.k.a. The Gift of Gab) formed: Blackalicious. After creating some killer underground singles and getting their stuff out there on some Quannum comps, Blackalicious issued their first album, Nia, in 2000. They toured behind this record like champs, and when it came time to make the move to MCA, they showed no shame, because the CD still carried the Quannum name.
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Blackalicious
Blazing Arrow
MCA, Released 2002
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What one wants from music is usually determined by what one wants from life. Maybe you want your tunes and your universe to be laid out for you, easy-peasy, like Mommy used to do with your school clothes - that's cool, that's you. Me, I demand everything from music, but I don't need it to come easy. I like difficulty, mess, over-reaching; I like my happiness to have sadness in it, my grief to contain seeds of hope, and my anger and fear and confusion and giddiness and horniness and wonder and soul-eating depression to be lurking right around the corner. You should hear my damn mix tapes.
So when I say that this album by Blackalicious is the one hip-hop album that seems to fit my personality more than anything else ever, even more than De La Soul Is Dead and Resurrection and By All Means Necessary and It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, you now know why. This is the one that has it all: 75 minutes of every feeling and emotion in the world, 17 tracks that range from avant-garde turntablism to laid-back pop to freestyle to singer-songwriter pop to old-school funk. It's not just an album, it's a philosophy, a mission statement of strength and grace and intelligence.
And it's a sexy MF too. From "Bow and Fire," the opening intro track, a scorching organ-laced number that doesn't even attain the two-minute mark, to the final meditative "Day One," The Gift of Gab and Chief Xcel create an atmosphere in which anything can happen, and then make it happen. The only thing missing from Blazing Arrow is the crap that other albums supply in mega-doses. You want that shit, look elsewhere. You want hot jams that mean something, tracks that burn with intensity and smolder with wisdom and bang like couples on prom night ... you come on over here.
We'll start with Xcel, who has really stepped up his game here from Nia -- their debut was amazingly great but a little too laid-back for the most part. Here, the tracks are tight and amazing, really joyously complex without turning into techno-sludge or orchestral folderol. The way he sculpts "Paragraph President" out of a single phrase on De La's "This Is a D.A.I.S.Y. Age" is stunning; the subtle horn touches and intricately layered Gil Scott-Heron vocal on the chorus of "First in Flight" should win the Nobel Prize for DJing. He's way better than he needs to be, but I ain't complaining.
And Gab is the most intelligent MC working today. He's never less than articulate, always has his heart in the right place, and his deft lyrical skill is really Rakim-worthy on much of this record. He goes balls-out here, whether it's his insane surreal science-class workout with Cut Chemist on "Chemical Calisthenics" or his tale of rebounding from a bad relationship and becoming a better person on "Nowhere Fast." Gab does well bouncing off other MCs; his old Quannum partners Lateef and Lyrics Born get great features - when the hell is Latyrx gonna make a new album? - and J5's Chali 2na and Dilated Peoples' Rakaa both come off fine.
But this is really Gab's album, a look inside his expansive and beautiful soul. He's positive ("Make You Feel That Way" and "First in Flight" should actually be able to attract negative ions out of the air), but he's not boringly so, and his more whacked-out pieces, like the 10-minute, three-part "Release" and the Ben Harper collabo "Brain Washers," work just as well as the hot jams "Aural Pleasure" and "Sky Is Falling." And when he explains the circumstances of his life on "Purest Love" (both parents died when he was young, he was raised by his siblings in a tough gang-infested small California town), it's really pretty inspiring, but it won't make your teeth hurt.
I'm gonna shut up now. Suffice it to say that this album has lifted me out of the Slough of Despair and into the World of Purest Love. I like this place.
If you like Blackalicious, check out:
Blackalicious Nia
De La Soul Three Feet High and Rising
Mos Def Black On Both Sides
Quannum Projects Quannum Spectrum
Solesides Crew Greatest Bumps
Jill Scott Who Is Jill Scott? Words and Music Vol. 1
Jurassic 5 Quality Control
Common Resurrection
-- Matt Cibula
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