Genre: Hip-Hop
Label Number: B0004670-02
☠: Selected by Lass
© 2005 Geffen Records
Electric Circus cost and won Common
some fans. It was very exploratory, especially so for a rap album
released in 2002, containing developments -- some of which soared, some
of which sank -- that few longtime followers could have foreseen.
Listeners either felt Common was picking up fresh, new inspirations, or that he was just being distracted by a whole lot of ill-fitting nonsense. With Be, it seems the MC has realized that not every album that's sprawling and eclectic is as good as Electric Ladyland or Songs in the Key of Life.
More notably, he might've been struck with the fact that a high
percentage of excellent albums are around 40 minutes in length and are
built on a unified sound. Be
is highly concentrated, containing 11 songs and involving two producers
and a small number of guests. It's a 180 degree turn from Electric Circus, and in a bizarre way it's both a progression and a back-to-basics move. Kanye West and Dilla
are key to the album's steadiness, rooting the sound in '70s soul and
soul-jazz. That's no shakeup, but the two producers deserve some form of
award for stringing together a consistent sequence of productions that
is never monotonous, dull, or all that flashy. Even lead single "The
Corner," heard well before Be's release, falls into the fabric of the album on first listen, as if that were where it belonged all along. Lyrically, Common
comes back down to Earth -- the narratives are sharp as ever, the
gripes are more like observations than screeds, and the eccentricities
need to be teased out rather than swatted away. Be isn't likely to be referred to by anyone as groundbreaking, but it's one of Common's best, and it's also one of the most tightly constructed albums of any form within recent memory.
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tags: common, be,. 2005, flac,
