Half God

New York rapper Wiki had been consistently active for years leading up to third album Half God, but he finds a new level of expression here with a combination of inspired lyricism, masterful production, and evocative depictions of city life that tie it all together. Produced entirely by genre-shaping producer Navy Blue, (who before this worked on boundary-pushing albums by Earl Sweatshirt, MIKE, and others), the instrumentals on Half God update the wistful string samples and steady hi-hat grooves of classic East Coast hip-hop, folding in subtle atmospheric touches while keeping things minimal. Cinematic tracks like "Drug Supplier" and the gripping opener "Not Today" barely have drums at all, while "Still Here" and "Remarkably" offer a new approach to the kind of dusty rhythms that RZA might have used for his beats in the '90s. Wiki's rapping is charged and personal, zipping between an unguarded portrayal of the inner workings of his mind on "Roof," scathing take-downs of gentrification and the bridge and tunnel crowd on "The Business," and moments of raw storytelling, giddy wordplay, and non-stop ingenuity throughout the album's 16 tracks. On its surface, Half God could be misconstrued as another "love letter to New York" with Wiki consistently painting a striking picture of the experiences unique to the Big Apple. Looking more closely, however, Half God becomes much more than Wiki's tribute to his city because of how much of himself he puts into the songs. Much as Nas' Illmatic, Wu Tang's 36 Chambers, and The Notorious B.I.G.'s Ready to Die all defined New York hip-hop by offering individualized perspectives on an ungovernable metropolis, Wiki also puts himself in the center of it all on Half God, and in doing so becomes an inextricable part of New York's magic, suffering, and boundless inspiration ~ Fred Thomas