Insomniac El-P too busy being awesome to sleep

By Nate Adams
Collegian Staff
April 18, 2007

El-P’s I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is a lot of things. It’s dark, both in mood and in concept. It’s challenging, both in its lyrical flow and in its production. It’s abrasive and harsh; some tracks on this album are downright difficult the first time around. It’s also innovative. It’s rich in layers and subject matter. And, it’s the best hip-hop album of 2007, no question.

Before getting into the album itself, let me first try to dissect hip-hop a little bit. For the purposes of this review, let’s put it into two categories. One half of hip-hop is the kind of thing one hears on the radio — hip-hop for the masses. It’s got beats that people can dance to, and the kind of catchy hooks that have a way of burrowing themselves into brainstems. Songs like “This is Why I’m Hot.” That’s Mainstream Hip-Hop.

The other half, the darker half of hip-hop, isn’t really much for dancing or hooks, and you won’t hear a lot of songs about the club or womanizing. This second brand of hip-hop puts more of its emphasis on flow; artists of this second brand like to play with words and internal rhyme schemes to see what complex structure they can create. The production is not so much about groove and beat as much as it is about creating a landscape for the lyrics to exist. This brand of production is never happy with stasis, and instead always tries to push itself forward. This is Underground Hip-Hop.

I’m not here to say which is better than the other, because both have got their pluses and minuses. I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is in the second category. So if that kind of hip-hop doesn’t sound that good to you, then this is not the record for you. However, if Underground Hip-Hop sounds like something you’d be into, then you need to get your hands on El-P’s latest.

Let’s ignore lyrics and production for a minute, and let’s focus solely on the atmosphere of this record. If the world were to end tomorrow, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead would be the soundtrack to the aftermath (so, yeah, this isn’t really a cheerful album). El-P’s sophomore release is full of dystopian paranoia against the government, his fellow citizens and the man looking at him in the mirror. This is a lonely, angry and fearful record that is focused on the times in which we live; the album supports the idea that something very big, and very bad, is going to happen very soon.

El-P works best on this album as a story teller. On the excellent opening track “Tasmanian Pain Coaster,” El-P takes on the roll of himself and a nameless, faceless wanderer who has been abused by the system and deals with it through substance abuse (umm, yeah, once again, not a happy album). Later on in the album, the one-two punch of “Habeas Corpses” and “The Overly Dramatic Truth” both focus on love, one painting El-P as a potential savior for a doomed love, the other showing him as jaded, evil seducer trying to protect his love by pushing her away, lest she be corrupted by his flaws.

El-P is also in prime battle mode, lashing out against war in “Dear Sirs,” an anonymous character who has crossed him in “Poisonville” and driving in NYC traffic on the aptly named “Drive.” And while he is never too concerned about sticking to the beat or making himself totally clear, there is a subtle brilliance in his lyrics, not to mention some seriously good one-liners throughout the album (the surface that gave birth to the style is NY/ the jihad recipient sky is too fly).

The production on this album is top notch; a combination of Public Enemy’s Bomb Squad and RZA’s ADD. El-P handles the bulk of the production himself, but he does get some guest help from Trent Reznor, (of Nine Inch Nails fame) The Mars Volta (who contribute on “Tasmanian Pain Coaster,” making it the best thing they’ve ever done) and Cat Power (indie folkie doing a shockingly good job on “Poisonville”). Each of the guests brings his or her own unique style to the record, and it fits with the doomed feel of the album.

Songs end miles from where they started, constantly pushing the beat to its limits with the subtle addition and subtraction of new elements. This kind of innovative production is what makes this album so good, yet so challenging. Because of the original and constantly shifting production, there is not much in the way of catchy melody. This, in the end, is my only complaint against the album; after two listens it is unbelievable, but getting through that first listen can be a struggle.

El-P has made more than just an album. It is a snapshot of the world in which we live; where celebrities believe in alien saviors, the world seems pretty angry at us and people wake up every day fearing the worst. I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead is, hands down, the best hip-hop record of the year, underground or mainstream, and maybe one of the top 10 best of the last 10 years.

adamsn1@lasalle.edu