Since his Co Flow days El-P's been on another level in smack talk. It might not have flowed well, it might have been a word-heavy bar, but El-P proved his awareness of that on “The Fire In Which You Burn” when he stated “even when I say nothing it's a beautiful waste of negative space”. The first single from Cancer For Cure puts El-Producto back in shit-kicker mode.
Funcrusher Plus was definitively lo-fi. Since then, El-P's been honing a space age doom funk sound all his own with a crystalline futurism pitted against the lo-fi. Two solo records and several beat-centric megamixxxes later, he's found a balance between the cacophonous terrors and bass rumblings of beat music, a feat in hip hop first mined by The Bomb Squad. More importantly, it's a style with few imitators (save for a few beats by Mike Finito on Himanshu's Nehru Jackets tape). In achieving that balance, he's garnered interest in his production from unlikely suitors like Killer Mike, who recorded his upcoming solo record R.A.P. Music exclusively with El-P.
Last year's “Drones Over BKLYN” broke the silence of solo el-p rap output. Today we get “The Full Retard”, which has El-P breaking a cardinarl rule of acting with his re-introduction, while a loop insists we “pump this shit like they do in the future.” Will “fuck start your burp hole” replace El's famous “mouth fucked by Nazis” line as a crowd favorite to yell as the DJ crosses the fader? Let's find out in Austin.
El-P, “The Full Retard” (via Pitchfork)
Cancer For Cure is out May 22 on Fat Possum and features guest spots from Danny Brown, Mr. MFN eXquire, Killer Mike and Paul Banks of Interpol.
