Reflection Eternal Talib Kweli amp HiTek - Revolutions Per Minute (17 tracks) +Album Reviews

"Revolutions Per Minute" is a little underwhelming

Lucky Sevens | Tiger Town, Alabama | 05/18/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"After a decade apart, Talib Kweli and producer Hi-Tek- collectively known as Reflection Eternal- return with a new album, the aptly titled "Revolutions Per Minute". This new album is a sharp left turn from its predecessor, their 2000 debut "Train Of Thought". On this project, it's decidedly more commercial which can be attributed to them being on the major label Warner Bros. Records. The album starts off with the rather slow "City Playgrounds" which would have been better suited for being in the middle of the album. "Back Again" features the long absent RES sounding noticeably different. Both tracks "In This World" and "Long Hot Summer" feature background vocals from Belinda Lipscomb, lead singer of the 1980's funk band Midnight Star. "Got Work" is a song in which fame is likened to a drug addiction, while "Ballad Of The Black Gold" addresses the controversy and conflict over the ever-present oil crisis. The song "Lifting Off" is, by all accounts, a weed song complete with an equally smoky sonic backdrop. Talib handles primarily most of the lead vocals with the exception of the song "So Good" which is the lone track in which Hi-Tek actually performs on. The album's best song "Strangers (Paranoid)" shows Talib Kweli getting upstaged by Bun B of UGK. There are a few setbacks on "Revolutions Per Minute". The songs "Get Loose" with Chester French and the Estelle assisted "Midnight Hour" are just plain mediocre, while "In The Red" suffers from rather mundane production. Overall, Reflection Eternal crafted a good album, but it's a little too radio friendly- even for them."

Classic cd Masterpiece I almsost didn't buy

Luke | ATL | 05/20/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I'm glad I got this cd. Damn this cd is a classic. 17 songs and they all sound different and good and are in depth with lyrics and beats that sound creative. I'm not going to give a song by song. Instead, I'll say Kweli's lyrics have been pretty good to me always but his delivery, hooks, voice, and beat selection bothered me too much to pick up most of his cd's, even though i did hear them. This cd is different than his last efforts. This one, is his best or at least next to the last Reflection Eternal. This cd is not commercial. Talking about oil spills, revolution, naming names of unknown or unpopular revolutionaries, and intricate storytelling, rhyme schemes used and this vocabulary is not commercial. I wish commercial artists did sound this good. Commercial artists I thought were about rapping songs where noone could be offended and only saying what is popular to say in society today or rappers scared to make a statement against the status quo and writing lyrics with no depth of thought to fully expand on a point beyond just an analogy or simile, cliche or quote. I thought commercial was to not challenge the listener. This album is great and if his name wasn't Talib it would probably go platinum like Lupe's next cd will. No knock at all on Lupe, I'm just saying when you've been in the game this long and people think they know who you are and your sound (like Talib), and then your sound sounds rejuvenated, people like me can slip up and miss it cause we wrote you off and categorized you as that dude who has nice lyrics whose subject matter repeats itself, flow is weak, and has that nasal voice and is old. It's rare as rare can get to hear an old rapper with as many cd's as he has come back this strong with this many different styles. It's like Hi-Tek breathed all the ingredients he'd been missing into em'. I didn't expect it. Straight up to Kweli, put all your money on promoting this cd. Don't think about the future. I wouldn't wait to promote the next one cause I've heard his stuff and unless he sticks with Hi-Tek I don't know if he'll ever do a cd better than this one. So bottom line if you've been like me who likes two or 3 songs off each of his past 6 cd's but no more, then just know that this cd is different and artistic and I liked all of it. I can't say if you'll like it or not."

Instant classic

Milton Thomas | Atlanta, GA | 05/22/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I find it funny because as the years pass, we assume we know all that an artist is capable of creating. So in turn, we write them off, or pass them off thinking they have nothing left to offer. As a deep rooted fan of hip-hop especially during the Rawkus Records movement, I've seen Talib and Tek grow, and mature their styles before my eyes. the first Reflection Eternal is merely a prelude to what they have created here. This is music for your soul, and it speaks directly to that part of you that attaches itself to sounds and rhymthms and rests there. This album is not a recording but a reminder. To those of us who thought that when all hope was lost and we had mis-placed hip hop to drugs, weapons, sexual promiscuity, etc. We have two men who transcended beyond the confines of the common, and expand their sound. I write this as I listen to the Outro. With a million and one thoughts trampling through my mind, and the song thumping out of my Skull-Candy headphones. I urge you to let the day pass and the night to come. Throw this C.D. in and let the sounds guide you.

Stay Blessed.

Hip Hop isn't lost, it's just mis-placed."

Mediocrity has become the norm

peacenik | new orleans, la | 06/15/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Maybe because it's all been done before, or because it "died" (it didn't, but it might be molding), or maybe because American capitalism has finally swallowed big and small acts alike, no one can deny that hip hop has changed not from "bad" to "worse" or from old-school to new-school to new-old-school, but to just plain mediocre. Maybe 808s have just outworn their welcome, maybe someone needs to invent a new piece of beat machinery. Either way, what was once a common enemy typified by Tribe's Show Business, the almighty machine of Record Company People and their adoption of anything that sells, has left the music somewhere beyond left field (maybe the hot-dog vendor?), in a business routine well beyond any EPMD album title, in some no-man's land of lackluster, sporadic, occasionally-inspired mediocrity. What seemed so vital, so necessary, so passionate in 1993 feels over-produced, under-produced, or auto-produced in 2010, although one could make the argument it was already beginning when Rawkus nose-dived into a spotty caricature of its former self, if it ever was anything more than a couple of folks in the right place at the right time who could only ride the coattails of luck so long before they learned to love the bomb ride down, Dr. Strangelove style. It's not that this new one from Hi Tek and Kweli is awful, that would be easy, even preferable. It's that it fails to move me in the slightest while managing to avoid all of the typical gaffes that at least provide for some moments of sarcastic relief. Just when the beat in Midnight Hour starts to work its magic, it gets squashed. Just when I start nodding off during Lifting Off, I start ignoring Kweli's chorus of overdubbed punch-ins and start following Hi Tek's bassline, weaving in and out of subtly-plucked strings and tonal undercurrents. It's that it feels like Kweli and Hi Tek still have something to offer us, still have talent between the ears, still find small moments of solid connection, that its so frustratingly average when all is said and done. I have a love-hate relationship with Train of Thought, but Kweli has always been a gifted lyricist, and I can even get over dry-cleaning he did to his delivery, trading in that once uniquely divisive, rushed, unpredictable flow for the standard hit-every-quarter-note gravelly tone he puts out these days. Everybody's entitled to switching up their style, it's not that Kweli changed, or that he changed for the worse, its that he didn't change enough, for better or worse, and I keep hoping some late release by Kweli or Mos will somehow turn in something truly inspired and well-crafted, and unfortunately, Revolutions Per Minute ain't it. I'd take Memories Live, or even More or Less from Eardum, over just about anything on here. Ballad of the Black Gold is a decent track, but there's always high hopes for these two, maybe the bar was just set too high so many years ago. It doesn't knock (come on hi-tek! wtf?), it doesn't take you off into magical lala land, bring you to tears or pour champagne down your earholes...it just..kinda...goes."

Hi Tek didn't bring it

William Telle | Atlanta, GA USA | 06/14/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I was midly disappointed in the new Reflection Eternal album. Probably spoiled from Train of Thought and expected more flavor. As always, Talib is talkative and charasmatic. The only problem is the tracks are boring. There is only 1-2 head nodders on the whole joint. I think Hi Tek was really trying to do something different with this album. It's not gonna sell anyway--so doing his art or something.. For heads that came up on this backpack stuff, I feel like the tracks are just plain and without meaning consequently wasting Talib. Hopefully he and Mos will make another Black Star record."

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