Aquemini Review

It is seventy five minutes long and there is nothing to remove. The band is enormous here, real horns and guitars and a rhythm section that swings, and the arrangements shift constantly without ever losing the thread. Rosa Parks is the impossible single, a stomp and a harmonica breakdown that got played on the radio and should not have been. Da Art of Storytellin' Pt. 1 is the best narrative rap of the decade, two verses about the same girl told from opposite ends of a life.

SpottieOttieDopaliscious is a horn loop and a spoken word monologue that dozens of records have tried and failed to copy. Liberation is a nine minute gospel piece that has no business closing a rap album and closes it perfectly. The two writers are pulling in different directions and the tension is the fuel rather than the crack. Everything they attempted afterwards is measured against this.