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Jun 30, 2011As the mainstream becomes more and more predictable, Shabazz Palaces' inscrutability is a welcome change. Because the beats are so abstract, roots take precedent, and a strong presence on the microphone becomes the most important aspect.
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Jun 27, 2011It's deeply refreshing to hear an artist who exudes such depth and consideration.
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UncutJul 28, 2011There's an earworm-like lure in every track. [Aug 2011, p.98]
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Jun 28, 2011This is an album with a brilliant sound, one that is as arresting to listen to as it is to puzzle over.
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MojoNov 22, 2011In the category of great rap reinventions, file it next to Daniel Dumile's post-KMD rebirth as MF Doom and Ultramagnetic's MC Kool Keith re-training as Dr. Octagon. [Aug. 2011, p. 94]
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Jun 27, 2011On his Sub Pop debut, he's sliced off the excess, preachy rhetoric for something inventive, bold and brilliantly fresh.
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Aug 15, 2011Reborn as Palaceer Lazaro in Shabazz Palaces, the rapper still waxes poetic with the old boho bounce as he lounges in the club or decries the evils of American culture.
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Jul 1, 2011Black Up points toward hip-hop as a source of headphone albums as the Seattle collaborative offers intriguingly fractured surfaces under their vocals, alternating brain-tweaking minimalism with jarringly complex rhythms and vinyl-ripped ephemera.
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Jun 27, 2011Black Up, their full-length debut, connects black consciousness with the dark mysteries of deep space, synthesising tribal drums, kalimba and African inflections with fragmented beats and eerie, futuristic synths.
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Jun 28, 2011A killer second act.
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Jun 21, 2011He still enigmatically declares solidarity with the urban proletariat and critiques pop-culture clichés, but Black Up impresses most with its beguiling sounds.
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Entertainment WeeklyAug 10, 2011It's a shame that Palaceer Lazaro uses his nee project to spit flimsy verses about back-in-the-day cliches. [1 Jul 2011, p.74]
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Jun 28, 2011Black Up reveals Shabazz Palaces as an artist much more in line with the future, voicing his dissatisfaction by carving his own path.
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Jun 24, 2011Though the harsh synth textures and borderline-disjointed edits from the EPs remain, the record as a whole is simultaneously hazier and more distinct: more fine detail in the cavernous reverb, more impact with every tumbling, hypercompressed stack of drum samples.
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Jul 21, 2011Yes, there are some jazz and soul influences here and a few earnest lyrics, but this is way more dark, futuristic and cutting-edge than you'd guess.
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Aug 9, 2011This is hip-hop that doesn't attack; it drifts. Black Up is full of ghostly howls and weird barely-there percussion, devoid of anything like a single.
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Jul 11, 2011Black Up is at first mind-bending and perhaps confusing in its production and aesthetic, making it easy to lump in with fringe rap artists cLOUDDEAD. But to do so ignores the visceral qualities of the album, both in Butler's lyrics and in the production.
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Jun 27, 2011If there's been a better album, hip-hop or not, out this year, I haven't heard it.
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Jul 6, 2011The calm rhymes juggle thoughts of black identity, paranoia, lust and possibility. Yes, hip-hop still has an audacious progressive fringe.
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Jun 21, 2011Black Up is far from a fuzzy, unfocused indie-rap document. Butler's rhymes remain lyrical and tight, musing on desire and motivation, artistic freedom and Afro-American identity, in a way that should appeal to the Talib Kweli fans out there.
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Jun 28, 2011Like on that grand finale the production on Black Up is meticulous but furtive, always pushing forward, often unwilling simply to loop. And Butler's rapping sounds perfectly at home in this sometimes chaotic environment, kicking it amidst the kinetic verve of his beats.
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Jul 6, 2011Shabazz Palaces have pushed the music forward, so that it once again can be raw, real, and unconventional.
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Jun 21, 2011Following a pair of brilliant EPs, Shabazz attacks with Black Up.
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Aug 12, 2011Black Up is best digested as a whole rather than tune by tune.
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Aug 3, 2011Any adventurous soul with both Drake and Sun Ra back to back on his or her iPod will most certainly be able to get down with this truly unique hip-hop experience.
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Aug 1, 2011While some of Black Up isn't a million miles from his former group's darker corners, it's not particularly like much else. It's all present tense, in a way too little is, and brash, bold, and weird about it. Per one of his more baffling lines: "up, or don't toss it at all."
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Jun 21, 2011It's difficult to decide whether Butler's thing is psychedelic thuggishness or thuggish psychedelia, and he probably doesn't intend for us to figure it out. Either way, he's done the near-impossible in creating a sound that's wholly fresh and grows richer with every listen.
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Mar 13, 2012Shabazz Palaces created an album that is deep, dense, cryptic, hypnotic, and beautiful in its own freaky way.
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Jul 18, 2011Mind-blowing and catchy, Black Up is an album too progressive to pass up. Get on this as soon as possible.
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Jul 5, 2011That's Black Up's predicament: It wants to be experienced viscerally, but it's being stripped of life by over-intellectualization.
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Jul 5, 2011Black Up is a wild ride, but Butler's songwriting is not haphazard. To be sure, his laid-black flow channels a vibe similar to the who-cares attitude of those on the opposite side of the left-field hip-hop divide, but don't let that fool you; his music is weird, but it's also deliberate.
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Jun 30, 2011What's likely to stick out first and foremost on the 10 tracks that comprise Black Up are the beats.
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Jul 12, 2011Play loud. I can't speak to the listening practices of the post-illbient beatmakers whose tricks Palaceer Lazaro gathers together and improves on like he's just been waiting for the go-ahead from Tricky himself.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 47 out of 53
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Mixed: 2 out of 53
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Negative: 4 out of 53
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Jun 30, 2011
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Jun 30, 2011
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Jun 28, 2011