March 1999 ear candy by Ben Auburn |
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A Prince Among Men
There's a long, sad history of concept albums in pop. There's a shorter,
happier history, too, but for every Ziggy Stardust there's three or
four Tarkuses: messy, stupid, dull "statements" that don't say
anything. It's not surprising that people have shied away from full-length
song cycles of late. For the first half of the nineties we became
increasingly obsessed with 'authenticity,' either in the form of grunge
anger or keepin' it real hip-hop style; since then over-programmed radio
and increasingly profit-centric record companies have sucked the wonder out
of one hit wonder, putting out album after album with one blow-up single
and a bunch of garbage. The more attention an album requires -- deserving
or not -- the less likely it is to get it.
Which makes it a perfect time for A Prince Among Thieves.
Written, produced, arranged, scored, and "hustled" by Prince Paul, the man
who brought you Stetsasonic and the first three De La Soul albums,
Prince is a cross between Menace II Society, Airplane,
and Sweeny Todd -- the world's first hip-hop musical. Or at least
the first one worth listening to. Packaged like a movie soundtrack,
complete with fake film stills, the thirty-five tracks are almost evenly
split between narration, dialogue, and songs, all from a movie that, as of
yet, doesn't really exist. [Just you wait, though: Chris Rock's already
bought the screen rights.]
If you're thinking it's either ambitious or stupid, you're right on both
counts. Paul's actually weaved together a coherent narrative -- albeit one
he pieced together from twenty different sources -- which is punctuated
with moments of sheer (and almost definitely intended) idiocy. The Prince
Paul spin right now is pretty consistent: he's the Inventor of the Hip-Hop
Skit (see Spin's feature article, Rolling Stone's review of
Prince, and many more), first realized on De La's first record.
Sure, that fits with this project - the longest series of skits Paul's
ever done -- but what most people miss is more crucial: Paul's probably the
only hip hop producer who ever sounds like he's having fun. There's a
sneaky bounce to a Paul track, even the dark ones -- you get the sense that
instead of making him proud, building the perfect beat actually makes
Prince Paul happy.
You can hear it all through Prince, from Kool Keith's track as Crazy
Lou the weapon dealer, to the obligatory Biz Markee cameo, to the climax
"You Got Shot." As gloomy as the moral can get there's always the sense
that Paul's behind the boards smirking.
Does it make sense to make a meta-concept album? Not only is there a
narrative that runs through the record, but it's a fake narrative --
snippets from a whole that doesn't exist. Paul's typically been on the
opposite side from the mainstream, and Prince doesn't take him any
closer. What's amazing -- aside from the fact that he can sustain the joke
through the whole record -- is that the record, even distilled down to just
the hip hop tracks, is so good.
Prince Paul, so contrary, he won't even make a bad concept album.
in the junk drawer:
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