Mos Definitely a great album

Mos Def is an unusual hip-hop renaissance man. He's made his name as one of the fiercest rappers out today. He's impressed audiences on the silver screen and on Broadway. He's even crooned a song or two. But now we finally get to see the other side of Dante Smith. On The New Danger, Mos Def is a rock star plain and simple -- and he's pretty damn believable at it.\nOn his debut album, Black on Both Sides, Mos Def sang "Elvis Presley ain't got no soul/Bo Diddly is rock 'n' roll," lamenting about how black music has been harvested and turned into white entertainment. Ironically, most black people have turned their back on modern rock 'n' roll, but Mos has a plan for bringing them back.\nThe biggest threat in his arsenal is Black Jack Johnson, his band made up of the guitarist from Bad Brains, the drummer and bassist from Living Color and the keyboardist from Parliament Funkadelic.\nThrashing guitars meld well with Mos' angry lyrics on "Ghetto Rock" and "Freaky Black Greetings." Blues riffs on "Blue Black Jack" may seem cookie-cutter, but they break down into some great solos toward the end. Mos even puts the instruments into his own hands, playing the piano, drums, guitar and bass on a couple songs.\nMos doesn't ignore hip-hop by any means, he just sandwiches it between his experimental rock/hip-hop concoctions. He parodies Jay-Z with political consciousness on "The Rape Over," where he spouts, "White people running this rap shit." An amazingly-catchy flute-powered beat accompanies him on "Sex, Love and Money," and Kanye West provides the sole celebrity production on "Sunshine." The lyrical highpoint would have to be on "Close Edge," the flow made famous on "Chappelle's Show," where he spits some of his best rhymes since 1998. The only downside is with the background playing such an important role we never get to hear Mos Def's energetic rapid-fire flow, which means less political uppercuts to throw.\nIt's hard to call The New Danger a follow-up album because it strays so much from his debut. Make no mistake about it, this is a rock album first and foremost and will most likely disappoint people wanting another Black on Both Sides. Nobody reigned Mos in on this album, with no celebrity cameos or commercial singles. It takes guts to put out a nine-minute song, but it seems like Mos did what he wanted to do, without folding to any pressure. I'd compare it to Beck's Mutations which was so different that most fans didn't call it a true follow-up (but of course, that's my favorite Beck album). \nUnlike his partner Talib Kweli, who keeps pushing for more commercial success, Mos has seemed to abandon that pursuit. He risks alienating some of his core audience, but he's doing it for the betterment of hip-hop. He wants to broaden the ghetto's musical palate and won't sell out to do so. Hopefully, the streets are listening.