4/5
Deep Impact
Like a Led Zeppelin Hindenburg, on his black and white album artwork, Chuck D is a Public Enemy once again. All in the same week that Snoop Dogg asks 'Iz It A Crime', giving evidence for this to be a great New Music Friday in hip-hop, especially out west with the 'Kingmaker' Xzibit giving us a comeback album to highlight the onslaught. Flavour Flav's P.E. brother's first solo set since 2023's 'We Wreck Stadium' (the last Enemy album was 2020's aptly titled, 'What You Gonna Do When The Grid Goes Down'), feels more like a group project. As Chuck D Presents 'Enemy Radio' and the album 'Radio Armageddon', feeling like a 'Radio Nowhere' call to arms for rap's Springsteen.
"All things must die so they can live", the artwork of this Def Jam Recording tells us. And right out the gates, after the album self-titled intro, D rocks "Philosophy, politics, rebellion, recovery/Gimmicks, magic, inspiration, music/Fans, the road, drums, sexy/Racism/Rock and roll is the white version of rhythm and blues, okay?/No, I mean, this not no prejudice thing, so don't do that, alright?/I'm just tellin' you the real truth/Religion, industry, doom", over telling us 'What Rock Is'. All as this hall of famer and pure poet still has game like another Denzel and Spike Lee movie. 'Highest 2 Lowest', you can't touch him too. And even though there is no A$AP Rocky, or Rihanna, there is a cast collection of unique artists making their mark on this 808 canvas. All mattering as we proclaim 'Black Don't Dead', like DJ Too Tuff. These 'New Gens' ready for their moment with hip-hop's forefather in the forefront.
CM AKA Creative gives us a 'Station Break'. All as Phill Most Chill goes 'Rogue Runnin'' like an 'Andor' season. 1/2 Pint and Miranda Writes asks 'Is God She?' as Chuck attests, "My brother, my sister, my father, my mother Go deep past the sleep where God pulled back the cover/Let's get within inside the skin, blood runneth under/The ways of man ain't so kind, the blind stands to suffer/No compassion, crashin', testosterone sin/Exile, classified, we can't think again/Check a hero, don't confuse her with his masculine fix/Swear to God, she could never be no son of a b####." Now, what did we just tell you about that poetry? It's in motion still for the 'Station Identification'. Then The Impossebulls come charging in like Chicago for 'Here We Are Heard'. Lend your ears to the 'Superbagg' of Black Madeen, or what ULTRAMAG7 has here as 'Carry On', and you'll see that nothing is fumbled. Especially when D meets another one in Donald D and Jazzy J for the sweet 'Slight Story Style Sound'.
Yet before the Def Comedy Jam like 'Signing Off' with Schoolly D, Chuck D asks 'What Are We To You?' on a fresh and raw choice cut. "All over the place, I may not got no friends/I'm burnin' a damn candle at three ends/But I know myself, you might not know who I am/You probably pack right up, go home and say, "Damn" (Yeah)/If your mental got a problem with this rap instrumental/What's the color of time got to do with these rhymes?/Say the darker the berry, say the thicker the juice/New generation's hatin', that same old truth/Why the same shit be happenin' 'til we long in the tooth?/Pеople, people bе people, the red blood is the truth/The red pill will be taken in case you feel ill/You know the time to run, it's time to get ill." Real rhymes to go with the track's title question, over and over again in chorus, asking "who are we?" Chuck D and the rest of Public Enemy gave rap, black music and lives a voice when no one else did. And to this day, the microphone is not getting chucked, as D fights the power to his last. And man, oh, man is he lasting in this waged war. Turn on your radio, away from the bulls### that Dead Prez told you about. In this hip-hop world that's only getting bigger, the Armageddon is almost over. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'What Rock Is', 'Black Don't Dead (Feat. DJ Too Tuff)', 'What Are We To You?'
Spin This: Public Enemy - 'Fear Of A Black Planet'.
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