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Reviews Summary![]() ![]() |
Outstanding - Urb / Genius - BBC / Experimental and fresh - Hip-Hop Connection / Intoxicating - Straight No Chaser / Decidedly cool and deadly - XLR8R / Treads where most wouldn't dare - DJ / Busdriver straight kills it - Hour / Certainly the best I've heard in a long time - Indigo Flow |
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As outsider's in the most popular genre on earth, indie rappers often place their cultural predicament at the center of their music. But no one has laid bare his burden quite like Los Angeles emcee Busdriver. Within fifteen minutes of Fear of a Black Tangent, he guesses that he'll "most likely sell more records in France" announces "the return of the unpopular dope rapper" and claims to be "as angst-ridden on Thanksgiving as you are when your favorite rapper gets dissed on an opinion-based site." Identity issues much? Well, you might be a little frustrated too if you were an African American rapper blessed/cursed with an elastic wit and a nasal flow that resembles Don Newkirk - the cheeseball who announced the game show prizes on De La Soul's Three Feet High and Rising. Paired with try-anything production from a host of indie-rap all-stars (including Danger Mouse and Prefuse 73), Busdriver's style might be called lyrics of fury. Yet the rapper's inborn goofiness just gives his words more bite. "Why do you hate me?" he asks on "Lefty's Lament." "Is it my numerous releases on Ninja Tune? / Or my ongoing fling with Reese Witherspoon? / Or is it because I'm the indecent Mr. Coon?" Answers: Yes. Being white, lyrical knot-twister Aesop Rock has never had to ask those questions. (His new album) Fast Cars, Danger, Fire, and Knives is the friskiest music he's made. Hey, wait a second - isn't New York supposed to be where everybody's bummed out and therapy-ready and Los Angeles where people just live? Indie rap - truly like no place on earth. - Spin |