JUST OUT / MUSIC
Common out of his element on new CD
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
RAP
“Universal Mind Control”
Common. Geffen. 10 tracks.
Grade: C
The rapper Common has been dabbling in acting lately, with small but memorable roles in “Smokin’ Aces” and “American Gangster.” In the coming film based on the DC Comics superhero cabal the Justice League, he will play Green Lantern.
But on “Universal Mind Control,” his eighth album, he takes on his most ambitious role yet: someone who enjoys having fun.
Common has long had a complicated relationship with pleasure. But he has also been a self-righteous rapper, though a musically palatable one, thanks especially to Kanye West, who produced the bulk of his two most recent albums.
Those albums were mature, eclectic and subtle. But schedule conflicts kept West from working on this one. Pharrell Williams of the Neptunes is the executive producer here, and he has no ambivalence toward pleasure whatsoever.
It’s a blatant mismatch, Williams’ blunt-force id with Common’s casual gravity. The Neptunes, who produce seven of the 10 songs here, treat Common as an obstacle to be worked around, which, in fairness, he is. He has become less nimble with age (he’s now 36), and there’s hardly any ease left in his locution, even when borrowing phrasings from Jay-Z, the Notorious B.I.G., Greg Nice or the Sugarhill Gang.
Worse, Common is at his least imaginative here. “Your physique brings out my freak,” he teases toothlessly on “Sex 4 Suga.”
The Neptunes have created beats better suited to a far more enthusiastic and versatile MC: shimmering, reverb-thick electro on the title track; sauntering lite-soul redolent of A Tribe Called Quest on “Punch Drunk Love”; sensational, woozy, blaring horns on “Gladiator.”
On that last track Common tries to reassert his legacy: “They say he’s a radical/He don’t fit the game.” But just a moment later he’s discussing Michael Vick and Nelson Mandela in almost the same breath; even his social conscience has been muddled. Paging Kanye West: Please phone home, Common needs you.
— Jon Caramanica, New York Times
ALSO OUT
• R&B singer and recent Atlanta transplant Musiq Soulchild shares what’s “OnMyRadio.”
• Atlanta’s DJ Smurf (aka Mr. Collipark) and Alfamega have a hand in R&B crooner Avant’s latest, “Avant.”
• R&B singer-actress Brandy resurfaces with “Human,” her first album in what felt like a long four years.
• “Drift” is a solo outing from Florida pop-rock act Sister Hazel’s lead singer, Ken Block.
• “Easy Come, Easy Go” is singer Marianne Faithfull’s turn at covering — and surely, sharply interpreting — standards.
• Country Music Hall of Famer Charlie Louvin “Sings Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs” — that’s the album title.
• Buena Vista Social Club’s Omara Portuondo has a new solo album, “Gracias.”
— Sonia Murray
