Standing at the Crossroads Review

My first thought upon taking in the new AD album Standing at the Crossroads was "score another one for the old guys."

At one point in time, it was nearly impossible for a rap artist to have a sustained career in the genre.  Even legends like Run-DMC struggled to stick around despite multiple comebacks.  Yet the careers of acts such as KRS-ONE, Public Enemy, and even say Jay-Z have proven that you can have a lengthy career in hip hop.  And recent albums over the last month or so by Nas with Life is Good, Public Enemy with Most of My Heroes Still Don't Appear on No Stamp, and Masta Ace with Ma Doom: Son of Yvonne have proven, once again and emphatically, that not only can veteran rap artists have a career, but they can remain artistically viable- not just viable, but they can remain at the peak of the artform.  If Chuck D lost some his flow he's lost none of his firepower or message, and Masta Ace may be using recycled beats by MF Doom, but since he's making those beats his own, I question whether that even matters.  (Doesn't hurt that I hadn't heard any of the beats going in I suppose.)

And Arrested Development can give away an album for free, and rather than it coming across as a glorified mixtape, we instead get an almost wholly original work of art that if I had paid for I wouldn't have felt slighted in the least.

Oh sure, there are a couple of songs we've heard before.  "Living" is the single that's been kicking around for a minute though it still sounds fresh, and "I'ma Fight Right Back Now" was released as a Speech single last year.  (It's personally not one of my favorites, but I understand it's inclusion.)  But other than that, we've got brand new songs, plus liner notes to boot.  I love liner notes, and these are superb, with each song broken down in detail along with full lyrics.




The album itself opens with "20."  Great opener, high energy, and I'm personally surprised they were able to make a good song from simply an anniversary year.  A song this self-referential really runs the risk of sounding like old guys talking about "back in my day" and this never does that.  Speech also successfully incorporates singing and rapping on this one, obviously borrowing from the template created by the almighty Drake.  Ha ha.

Other standouts for me include "Represent 1 Time" which is more of a straight-forward hip-hop look than we're used to from the crew, "Making a Vibe" which resembles "People Everyday" quite a bit to my ears, and "Raga in Coolangatta" which utilizes a Ravi Shankar sample according to blog contributor Kel, proving once and for all his musical knowledge far surpasses mine.

A particular mystery to me is "Soul Sister."  When I first heard the sample used, I did not expect to like this one (I don't hate the Train song or anything as it slightly grew on me after 1000 radio plays at work, but it just seemed like a bad idea to me).  But it's classic AD, uplifting and feeling like sunshine on a warm spring day.  It also brings up an interesting aspect of putting the album out for free: they are free to work in whatever samples they want, with no worries of being sued.  Using other artist's song without having to worry about royalties has been used to great effect by most rappers on mixtapes, but instead of simply rapping over other songs, on Standing at the Crossroads these are ideas brought to full birth, representing new compositions in the pre-sampling lawsuits rap tradition.

"My Reflection"  is another straightforward hip-hop track that works well, and "U & Me = 3" is another classic slice of AD.  The album closes with "Everywhere I Go," another strong tune, and by the end of it, you have a full new album that fits in perfectly with a strong catalog that stretches back to Three Years...  Rather than say more, listen to it yourself and let me know what you think.


That said, I'd still like to buy a hard copy- I'm an old guy that way.