Quite frankly, Soul has no shortage of skill. The other half of those five words referenced earlier, however, speak of skill. He's certainly shown the talent needed to craft a solid project before but it is not portrayed here. This is where the lack of talent Ab-Soul may inadvertently speak of on this album is shown. Instead, the listener is left with several hints at ideas for concepts and no real greater purpose. However, none of this merits much worth due to the fact that Ab-Soul appears unable to tie any of these themes together or even sew them up well individually. Yes, some of the framework is there: the feminist aspect (seen in tracks such as "God's a Girl?" and the irritatingly bland "HIStory/HERstory" pun on "Threatening Nature"), the themes dedicated to the late occult wiseman Allester Crowley (as heard on various tracks and most obviously noted in the album's title) and the continued underlining theme of "other-consciousness". What it does resemble, however, is some sort of attempt by Soul to venture into a still abstract, yet somehow more concrete, conceptual realm. It doesn't contain the overly-generic catchers of "These Days" (for the most part), and while it may try to give out the DMT-shaman/artist flavor of "Control System", it sincerely does not develop the chemically-infused logic into some sort of feasible sense like "Control System" did so cleverly. "Do What Thou Wilt" is not much like any of Ab-Soul's previous projects. Now this is a bit of a burst ahead into the flesh of this review but more importantly it is a foreshadowing. "I'm not talented, I'm skilled," are five words toward the end of "RAW (backwards)", the opening track on Ab-Soul's most recent album "Do What Thou Wilt", that in many ways explain both its beauties and its sharp disappointments. If you think about it, it takes courage to put that on wax.Ab-Soul :: Do What Thou Wilt :: Top Dawg Entertainment Soul explains, quite frankly, that he sips lean “just to say ‘get off my dick’,” and that’s that. Skipping ahead a song or so, Ab-Soul lightens the mood temporarily with “Mixed Emotions,” maybe the only ‘party-influenced’ number on the project, with its daytime soap-opera sample and talk of pool parties. In other words, they can’t see the stars for the stars. On the record Ab-Soul explains that he can’t take other rappers seriously because they “failed at testing what’s inside of them”. After “Terrorist Threats” comes “Pineal Gland,” a piano-driven macabre number which reveals the other side of Ab-Soul’s consciousness, literally. Except Timothy didn’t have a stripped-down, bass-heavy beat backing him That makes a world of difference. Soul calls for all the gangs in the world to unify in order to take over the White House, much like Timothy Leary once called for space colonization. He also puts his ‘sinister literature’ on full display, comparing himself to a stoned Albert Einstein, before concluding, “I’m a diamond ring in the trash, no reason to brag, it’s sad.” Soul continues his underdog brap-brap on “Terrorist Threats,” a Danny Brown-assisted futuristic call to arms. He supports himself outside the systems of control (more on those later). On “Track Two,” a synth-laden banger, Soul does well to convince us of his outlaw status. That is the sign of a true maker.Īb-Soul-Terrorist_Threats-EM0512 Download: Ab-Soul – Terrorist Threats f. Which means, Soul can take a bevy of similar sounds, and shape them to communicate a wide range of ideas. Yet, all of the beats more or less fall under the same category They are sparse, space-age, atmospheric dirges (Kudos to Digi+Phonics for mastering their schtick). There is gangsta rap, conscious rap, stoner rap, trill rap, however you want to label them. For instance, there are many different kinds of rap on Control System. Ab-Soul is a dynamic artist, yet at the same time he has this peculiar gift for cohesiveness. He has a raspy, high-pitched, often-contemplative delivery, that can either excite a reaction, make the listener smile, or make them cry. Unlike other contemporary rappers, who often invite comparisons to earlier artists – Kendrick and ScHoolboy to early Eminem, ASVP Rocky to Bone Thugs-n-Harmony – Ab-Soul is an artist unto himself. It also sets a precedent for future swag-era rap recordings They need to entertain, stimulate, push boundaries, and above all else, convince the audience that the maker is indeed trill: true and real. It proves that the self-proclaimed ‘deep thinker’ of TDE (which includes Kendrick Lamar, ScHoolboy Q, Jay Rock, and Soul) is a star on his own merit. Ab-Soul’s new full-length, independent album, Control System, accomplishes two things.
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