El-P – I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead
Michael Jackson is the king of pop...and El-P is the kang of Beets.
The biggest thing going for El-P on this particular album is the sheer bleakness on display here. At times it feels like the next generation mixed race cousin to Skinny Puppy's
Too Dark Park but with a sense of gallows humor and more accessibility / less chaos going on in the samples. This was a vision of authoritarian despair in a post-9/11 world and it sells this especially well on 'Habeas Corpses', 'Flyentology' and closer 'Poisenville Kids No Wins'.
This is one of those cases where I feel I like the album a lot more when I treat it as one "big" song, pessimistic snapshot that it is. When you break it down track to track it works a little less well, but the highlights were apparent. And even if you were in the small camp of people who hated this...well, there's always Run The Jewels.
8.5 out of 10