Album Review: billy woods, Messiah Musik - Church

In an era of ever-decreasing delays between albums as big names struggle to flood streaming services with enough instances of their name to maintain relevancy, it feels more laudable than ever when music is given enough time to germinate, both in the artist’s mind and in the studio. Fans can tell when a project is half-baked, and given the added financial pressures for artists to remain productive and profitable at all times, patience is a virtue that should be commended now more than ever. Then, of course, there’s billy woods, a rapper who has not only proven himself as one of the genre’s most thoughtful and adept lyricists but also rarely lets even half a year go by without adding to his already unrivaled discography. Most listeners are likely still scratching at the surface of Aethiopes, his universally acclaimed release with producer Preservation from earlier this year, and already the faceless rapper has returned with an uncanny array of beats (this time provided by longtime collaborator Messiah Musik) that form the foundation for his most affecting curriculum yet. Where Aethiopes presented a refined (though still revelatory) version of woods’ historical and political theses, Church finds him turning inward for its context, and all questions raised by such a hurried release schedule are decidedly answered by both its exposed, intimate nature and its unambiguous excellence.

Thirty seconds into the album and woods’ bars are already fully unabashed (“Clouds cleared, I’m looking at the city like jihadis in the cockpit”); as the spastic, eerie production settles into a comforting blend of piano and distant sax arpeggios, the rapper’s imagery and wordplay somehow only get more impressive: “Light drizzle on the tarmac/Whitey hit Hiroshima, then he doubled back/Black rain baptised, black skies/I’m always waiting on the thunderclap”. Even by woods’ standards Paraquat is a particularly foreboding introduction, but one which soon levels out as the album shifts towards the personal in lieu of (or at least, in addition to) the political, an aspect that works to distinguish Church among an already formidable oeuvre. Artichoke alludes to a life of tragic mundanity, a troubled and contentious existence leading only to a funeral overshadowed by the squabbles of those the dead left behind; it’s easy to imagine these were woods’ experiences at some point in his past, though we can only speculate. He still finds time for the occasional droll one-liner (“Lotta rappers worry about gender bending/I just peep who asked the question”), but the harsh, melancholic piety has already begun to seep in, and the only Eden awaiting anyone here is one of overgrown weeds and mass-produced plastic.

Messiah Musik’s beats inhabit the nooks and crannies that many other producers tend to gloss over, built from hazy, disjointed drum loops and seemingly inelegant sounds and instruments that nevertheless form the backbone of some incredibly memorable compositions. Take Schism for example, a cavalcade of deserved arrogance with some of woods’ coldest lines to date (“It wasn’t all at once, but trust me, everyone paid”) and a sample familiar to anyone who heard Aethiopes yet employed here for a completely distinct (though no less effective) purpose. Fuchsia & Green rattles and buzzes over ELUCID’s poetic hook and woods’ offbeat references (“Me and my girlfriend ride to the bloody end like the Ceaușescus”); Messiah’s instrumentals have often set the stage for ingenuity when the two rappers collaborate as Armand Hammer, and the creativity on display here is hardly an exception. Preceding this track is one of the record’s few stumbles, however, with the muddy production of Fever Grass practically tripping over itself from the get-go and not helped by a repetitive chorus only serving to sap what little energy woods’ verse had managed to generate thus far. Fortunately, the beat eventually lurches into a more acceptable meter as woods moves further and further back along his family tree, his folklore echoing with a reflective pathos: “My grandfather built God a house in the jungle, laid every brick/Mixed cement out of pain and sweat/Love, self-loathing, fear of the pit/That pitch black repent”.

As woods steps furtively through the first-person tableaus of Frankie, his words sketch out only the most innocuous details and leave the listener scrambling to fill in whatever few gaps they can manage. Messiah’s drums help keep the entire affair grounded, but it’s the distressed saxophone that sticks out the most, wailing and melting in the summer heat alongside woods’ stunning evocations: “Corner apartment, the sun run riot/French doors, hardwood shining to where the sun got tired/Frankie looking like she might just burst into fire”. Pollo Rico speaks in similarly intimate terms, while the organ notes and crooning vocals humming underneath invite a noticeably dour mood appropriate for what is perhaps woods’ most poignant track to date. The last words spoken on one’s deathbed have been deified by our culture for centuries, but loss is too often disturbingly mundane; sometimes the routine of trudging down linoleum hallways to press the same button on a hospital vending machine over and over again is all that remains to tether the dead to those left behind. Whether grappling with a private tragedy or the morbid legacies of imperialism, woods’ succinct language is overflowing with meaning: “My uncle told me you can’t bury that many bodies, they burned ‘em in piles/It was dark, I could see his teeth, it wasn’t a smile”.

Yet even this track (and the similarly subdued All Jokes Aside) are but a prelude to Magdalene, built upon a perfectly abstract vocal sample and an even more impressive ELUCID verse (“Suck my dick and tell me I’m beautiful” is one hell of an opening line). It’s telling that woods chooses here to rein in the analogies and allusions; tales of half-conscious drives down dark highways and ill-fated trysts fueled by addiction are related starkly, with much to read into between the narrator’s lines while the hopelessness of his situation remains all too apparent: “Car full of ghosts, HOV lane/Coast right off the interstate/Straight to voicemail, it’s a familiar rage/Far from home, but it’s a familiar place”. billy woods’ music does not enter the world on accident or impulse; even the white label compilation selectively distributed at Armand Hammer tour dates was carefully formed from misfit ideas (including the innocuous Artichoke), stitched together alongside freshly recorded material into a cohesive whole. Given that WHT LBL will never be released onto streaming services, that fans can so readily listen to Church and its confessionals adds another layer of significance to the parables of Magdalene, Artichoke, Pollo Rico, and their brethren that betrays their importance in a catalogue already without equal. Streaming might be a necessary evil for now, but for artists like woods and ELUCID, the desire to share one’s stories with a likeminded culture remains preeminent, and it is that desire which justifies both the urgency and the incredible quality of billy woods’ most sincere creation.

8.5/10

Favourite Tracks: Magdalene, Paraquat, Fuchsia & Green