Shabazz Palaces – Black Up
Sub Pop
Regardless of whether you accept the myth that Shabazz Palaces is a faceless collective of bohemians Seattleites or attribute the lion’s share of studio work to frontman Ishmael ‘Butterfly’ Butler — formerly of ’90s Grammy-winners Digable Planets – there’s no denying that Black Up is one of the most interesting and heavy-hitting hip hop records of recent years.
Following on from two previous EPs (CD editions of which came with symbolic sew-on patches for sleeves), a bonkers video modelled on obscure ’70s LA flick Killer Of Sheep and an almost deafening lack of publicity, Black Up is an arthouse mash-up of breakneck beats, progressive electronica, world music, jazz and poetry. There’s more than a hint of the resurgent lust for psychedelia being fed in LA by the likes of Flying Lotus (who co-produced the debut album by Gonjasufi, Butler’s cousin), though Ishmael’s rhymes — by turns brutal, hypnotic and melancholic — ensure that this remains a hip hop album at heart.
Yet it’s hip hop at its most unconventional; a collage almost schizophrenic in its stitching together of influences and ideas, and a record guided by instinct rather than received wisdom. A wistful African thumb piano surfaces from a storm of distorted children’s voices on ‘An Echo From The Hosts That Profess Infinitum’ (by no means the longest title), only to be subsumed by a wall of synths and Ishmael’s unnerving chant: “Who do you think you are?” ‘Endeavours For Never’ is a smoke-shrouded slice of basement jazz complete with swirling horns and a soulful female vocal, while the summery, sample-driven ‘Recollections Of The Wraith’ is shot through with lyrical imagery surreal enough to unsettle a Dr Octagon record.
Ultimately, the defining characteristic of Black Up seems to be its talent for shape-shifting; no sooner has a track settled into one form than it suddenly folds in on itself and turns into something else altogether. As such, its 36 minutes feel profoundly hallucinogenic in form — a super-concentrated DMT trip of a record that serves as the strongest indication yet of Butler’s obvious brilliance, and proof that hip hop can still provide thought-provoking works of art that are also heavy as holy hell. Cyrus Shahrad
