Mos Def - True Magic
MusicMash Rating: not rated yet
Pitchfork Media Rating: 4.5
There's more than a little griping in hip-hop circles these
days, and not just from disgruntled older listeners, hungry for something "fun" that
resembles the refracted memories of their youth. Fans are hungry for an MC they can genuinely admire-- one who doesn't resort to moral backpedaling,
misogyny, foolishness, or even guile. An honest guy, but not just an
everyman. A super-everyman. In many ways, Brooklyn's Mos
Def (née Dante Smith), should have been that guy. With his third solo album, True Magic, that dream is all
but over.
It's been rumored that this is a deal-closer, the last album
Mos owes Geffen Records, the label that inherited him when Rawkus Records
folded in 2002 and was rolled into Interscope Records' vast empire. Mos, who's
best known now as an Emmy-nominated actor, or concurrently "that guy from the
Denali commercial," seems to have lost any interest in a music career, at least
one under Geffen's umbrella. Everything about this album is half-assed: From
the bafflingly bare packaging to the at-times miserable mix, True Magic is a mess. Experimentation
has been an organizing principle for Mos for some time, from the jagged riffs
and polemics of "Rock N Roll" from his debut Black on Both Sides to the psych noodlings and bluesy
crooning on his last album, the uneven and only slightly less calamitous The New Danger. Here, experimentation
isn't even on the radar.
These songs feel blah-ed out, packed with idle rhymes that
sound as if they've been sitting in a notebook that never should have been
opened. Take this nugget from "Undeniable", a song nominated for a Grammy this
year, one presumes because Mos carries some sort of artistic clout: "These
jokers don't want none/ And all the pretty mamis want some/ Tell 'em come."
Thrilling.
The production doesn't help often, either. "Murder of a Teenage Life"
is turgid and off-key-- death knells for a rhymer-- while "Fake Bonanza" is the
sort of aimless, generic production that gives boho rappers a bad name. Some tracks here would be decent fodder for a C-level
mixtape, like "Crime & Medicine", a note-for-note remake of GZA's "Liquid
Swords", minus the Genius' lyrical bite and intensity. Also included is the
much-maligned "Dollar Day (Surprise, Surprise)", his Hurricane Katrina missive
released last year. Messily rhyming in an odd twang over Juvenile side project
UTP's "Nolia Clap", Mos received a pass for the song, as his heart is clearly
in the right place (at least he dissed Bono), even if his ear seemed
waterlogged. But to include it on a proper album is a poor move.
Still, Mos Def is an engaging figure that has long radiated the
charisma, if not the work ethic, to grab the mantle hanging above his head. "U
R the One" is a lovelorn, confused wail-- the grown continuation of his own
"Ms. Fat Booty". He raps: "When we met your face was so brown, your ass was so
round, of course I'm so down/ Wish I knew then what the fuck I know
now/ Couldn't read the signs of the road:...
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