If "Come Close" was a live marriage proposal, "Star *69 (PS With Love)" is a phone-sex honeymoon. Common's blue call to the object of his desire is couched in a sedate astral plane of analog keyboards and rippling wah-wah guitar, both contributed by the ingenious Prince.
Electric Circus certainly isn't perfect, as might be expected from a work that straddles genres long considered disparate. Often, Common's flow doesn't sound completely comfortable matched against the eclecticism of the music -- or vice versa -- which is the case with "Electric Wire Hustle Flower."
Whether intentionally or not, Common teases the listener by wasting a number of maddeningly tantalizing instrumentals as inconsequential interludes between tracks.
Despite the album's excesses, credit must be given to Common for fearlessly bringing elements of everything from Pink Floydian prog rock to Princely glam-funk to a rap record without completely losing the feel of hip-hop.
While the album might not become a hip-hop Sgt. Pepper's in terms of immediately accessible experimentation, it never goes too far off the deep end. The album's greatest strength, regardless of whether it completely hits the mark, is in its restless experimentation and its refusal to give into preconceived notions of what hip-hop is, can and should be.
By Tacque Kirksey
The Smashing Pumpkins
Earphoria
Something happened to rock music during the early '90s -- something great.
And even in the midst of rock greats like Nirvana and Pearl Jam, it shouldn't be so easy to forget about the Smashing Pumpkins.
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Never fitting cozily into one musical genre, the Pumpkins were equal parts goth rock and trippy romance until their 2000 breakup. But the early '90s were immensely important years for the band, and Earphoria serves as a tribute to those years. The album, a reissue of the 1994 soundtrack to their concert video Vieuphoria, has a few studio outtakes but mostly is culled from various live performances from 1993-94. These tracks represent an excellent cross section of performances of songs from Siamese Dream as well as the band's debut album Gish and their EP Lull.
As a whole, the album is strong but loses momentum on a few pop tracks that don't match the urgency and anger of the rest. Songs like "Quiet" and "I Am One" couldn't be better -- Billy Corgan's voice and the band's signature fuzzy guitars tear through with intensity that never will be replicated.
And a gently swaying acoustic version of "Cherub Rock" tones down the guitars but keeps the album going in the right direction.
Earphoria would be better, though, if this intensity wasn't disrupted by studio tracks like "Pulseczar" and "Bugg Superstar." Though good examples of experimentation with dream pop, they break the mood and make the listener yearn for Corgan's blood-curdling screams.
This aside, the album has priceless moments that alone make the album a worthy addition to any rock collection and a must for Pumpkins devotees.
By Caroline Lindsey
Talib Kweli
Quality
Once upon a time, two of the rising luminaries of the underground rap scene teamed up to create one of the genre's most fulfilling albums of the 1990s.
Mos Def and Talib Kweli's Black Star served as a marker for how inspiring, introspective and intelligent hip-hop could be. Kweli followed up his partner's Black On Both Sides with Reflection Eternal in 2000 -- but it wasn't a pure solo debut, as it was a collaborative effort with DJ Hi-Tek.
Quality, however, is all Kweli's show. It's a far cry from the violence and misogyny of G-funk, the emptiness of bling bling, the stark and spare East Coast sound and the fun but forgettable quality of most Southern bounce. Alternately joyful and angry, laid-back and banging, the album is always fresh.
The production by various artists isn't as cutting edge as, say, that by Organized Noize or the Bomb Squad in their heydays. But there's no denying that Quality is one of the most musically diverse rap albums to drop in a while.
The first proper track, "Rush," is a hard-hitting, guttural affair sparked by some dirty rock-guitar flourish. The upbeat "Shock Body" is driven by a celebratory throng of horns. The later songs go from summery funk to passionate R&B.
Kweli matches the music's power with his words and continues to prove that he's no lyrical dope. In "Get By," he delivers such insightful and poetic lines as "We commute to computers/ Spirits stay mute while you eagles spread rumors/We survivalists turned to consumers" and "The TV got us reachin' for stars/Not the ones between Venus and Mars, the ones that be readin' for parts."
"The Proud" is another example of b-boy rhymes being used as a forum for insightful commentary. Evoking the Oklahoma City bombing and the 9/11 attacks, Kweli examines America's problems -- both external and internal.
A new and fantastic statement from the underground, Quality most definitely lives up to its title -- it's one of the best hip hop records of recent memory.
By Elliott Dube
