Outkast - Stankonia on CD

Description

With their fourth-album, Outkast invoke the rebel Southern spirit to full effect. Realising there is something rotten in the state of hip hop, the Atlantan local heroes have staked out their own territory, Stankonia, a Utopian republic representing the best of the Dirty South. As if in tribute to Funkadelic's America Eats Its Young , the album cover finds Dre and Big Boi staring out in front of a black and white stars and stripes. Inside they waste no time in revealing their radical agenda. "Don't everyone like the smell of gasoline?" hollers Andre 3000 on opener "Gasoline Dreams", as he sets fire to the constitution over a scorching electric guitar. The single "B.O.B." (aka "Bombs Over Baghdad") is Outkast's state-of-the-union address, a rousing gothic gospel number that advocates a "power music electric revival" as it approaches the speed of Reprazent's "Who Told You" and the epic feel of "Bohemian Rhapsody". On "Miss Jackson", they assume the role of exemplary southern Gentleman begging forgiveness from their hoochie's mama over a backing with spooky shades of Prince's "When Doves Cry". Elsewhere they eschew tradition (on tracks like "?", "Snappin & Trappin" and the B-Real-guesting "Xplosion") to invest their dirty funk with a distinctly avant-garde afro-sheen. Come election day, just sniff this stank to inhale freedom. --Chris Campion Product Description Tracks 1.Intro2.Gasoline Dreams3.I'm Cool (Interlude) 4.So Fresh, So Clean5.Ms. Jackson6.Snappin' & Trappin'7.D.F. (Interlude) 8.Junction9.Kim & Cookies (Interlude) 10.I'll Call Before I Come11.B.O.B.B.12.Xplosion13.Good Hair (Interlude) 14.We Luv Deez Hoez15.Humble Mumble16.Drinkin' Again (Interlude) 17.Red Velvet18.Cruisin' In The ATL (Interlude) 19.Gangsta SH*T20.toilet Tisha21.Slum Beautiful22.Pre-Nump (Interlude) 23.Stankonia (Stanklove) Review Imagine the hip hop of today without the influence of OutKast’s fourth album. No Stankonia: quite possibly no Frank Ocean, no Janelle Monáe, no Shabazz Palaces; no southern playas taking the four elements from New York to outer space via the suburbs of the ATL. How boring. While Stankonia wasn’t the first taste of this dynamic duo’s inspired interpretations of rap – schizophrenic pieces that tapped funk up for its number before forgetting to call it back; snapping trap-rap rockers unleashed before the world caught up with the parlance – it was the most perfect distillation of everything that’d come before it. Immediate long-play predecessor, 1998’s Aquemini, was a plaudit-magnet in its own right; a platinum-seller which piqued significant domestic interest yet didn’t translate to a global audience. But with the new millennium came new opportunities for partners-in-rhyme André 3000 and Big Boi: Stankonia is the sound of every cracked-open door being kicked off its hinges. Before Stankonia came B.O.B – an unusual lead-single selection given its ménage-a-trois of jitterbug drum’n’bass, gospel backing vocals and a virtuosic instrumental sensibility owing much to Sly Stone and Hendrix. The single was no commercial high-flyer, but set a tone that its parent LP would adroitly adhere to: anything goes, so long as it flows. And flow Stankonia had to, brilliantly, because for the second consecutive set its makers pushed CD capacity, filling a 74-minute run-time. Amongst its 24 tracks are skippable skits, although these add contextual colour to the album’s singular bravado, but for the most part Stankonia serves the album format, rather than the other way around. Its sequencing, its pacing, these are perfect; transitions from casual vocabulary to lightning verses, electrifying. Time has painted some cuts as relative filler: the booty-clap bounce of We Luv Deez Hoez and fizzy meditation on carnal etiquette I’ll Call Before I Come are shallower of emotional depth than the still-exquisite Ms Jackson and the (Sign “O” the Times-period) Prince-recalling Toilet Tisha. It was Ms Jackson that cracked the UK for these ATLi