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| Black Thought & his Philly posse (w/guests Cody ChestnuTT, Musiq, Alicia Keys, others) on a tight, wide-ranging set. The Seed 2.0, Break You Off, Sacrifice, more. |
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| 1 Phrentrow |
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| 2 Rock You |
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| 3 !!!!!!! |
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| 4 Sacrifice |
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| 5 Rolling With Heat |
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| 6 Waok (Ay) Rollcall |
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| 7 Thought @ Work |
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| 8 The Seed (2.0) |
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| 9 Break You Off |
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| 10 Water |
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| 11 Quills |
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| 12 Pussy Galore |
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| 13 Complexity |
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| 14 Something in the Way of Things (In Town) |
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| 15 [Untitled Track] |
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| 16 [Untitled Track] |
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| 17 [Untitled Track] |
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| 18 [Untitled Track] |
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Album Review
The easy-flowing "Things Fall Apart" made the Roots one of the most popular artists of alternative rap's second wave. Anticipated nearly as much as it was delayed, the proper studio follow-up, "Phrenology", finally appeared in late 2002, after much perfectionist tinkering by the band -- so much that the liner notes include recording dates (covering a span of two years) and, sometimes, histories for the individual tracks. Coffeehouse music programmers beware: "Phrenology" is not "Things Fall Apart" redux; it's a challenging, hugely ambitious opus that's by turns brilliant and bewildering, as it strains to push the very sound of hip-hop into the future. Despite a few gentler tracks (like the Nelly Furtado and Jill Scott guest spots), "Phrenology" is the hardest-hitting Roots album to date, partly because it's their most successful attempt to re-create their concert punch in the studio. ?uestlove's drums positively boom out of the speakers on the Talib Kweli duet "Rolling With Heat"; the fantastic, lean guitar groover "The Seed (2.0)" (with neo-soul auteur Cody ChesnuTT); and the opening section of "Water." The ten-minute "Water" is the album's centerpiece, a powerful look at former Roots MC Malik B.'s drug problems that morphs into a downright avant-garde sound collage. Similarly, lead single "Break You Off," a neo-soul duet with Musiq, winds up in a melange of drum'n'bass programming and live strings. If moves like those, or the speed-blur Bad Brains punk of "!!!!!!!," or the drum'n'bass backdrop of poet Amiri Baraka's "Something In The Way Of Things (In Town)" can seem self-consciously eclectic, it's also true that "Phrenology" is one of those albums where the indulgences and far-out experiments make it that much more fascinating, whether they work or not. Plus, slamming grooves like "Rock You," "Thought @ Work," and the aforementioned "The Seed (2.0)" keep things exciting and vital. If this really is the future of hip-hop, then the sky is the limit. [The two hidden bonus tracks are "Rhymes And Ammo," the Talib Kweli collaboration that appeared on "Soundbombing, Vol. 3", and "Something To See," another techno-inflected jam.] ~ Steve Huey, All Music Guide
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• Biography
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Other albums by: The Roots |
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