Amazon.com's Best of 2001
The sheer force of Saul Williams's words puts to shame what most rappers dare to call poetry. It's hard to tell if rap fans will like Williams because while this slam poet is clearly a product of the hip-hop generation, his music is very uneasy listening. Imagine the brutal auditory assault that
KRS-One can bring combusted with the imagination of
Samuel Delany and political acumen of
Amiri Baraka and you get a loose vision of what Williams is capable of. But to truly appreciate him, metaphoric platitudes fall short--simply witness his art.
Amethyst Rockstar arms Williams with an electrified backing band capable of pumping out beats as frenetic as the poet's words, including a well-matched duet with
DJ Krust on "Coded Language." Cuts like "Om Ni Merican" and "Penny for a Thought" leave lacerations in their wake as Williams pushes the limit of wordplay with cosmos-inspired allegories and machine-gunned verses. His big ideas may be too much for some to take in--clearly, Williams isn't aiming to appeal to the lowest common denominator--but channel surf across the 11 songs on
Rockstar and each one has the potential to blow your mind.
--Oliver Wang
"
Why not rhyme about what you're feeling, or not be felt?" Saul Williams and John Denver, two with the gift of gab with God. Celestial bodies copilot Williams' debut release, a stunning workout of human language soaking in double meanings, social barbs and rhythmic density. To call him a poet sells him short; Williams is part philosopher, part prophet, a rare traveler capable of bending syllables and words around the universal vibration. Anyone who has followed Williams closely will recognize scraps cribbed from his two books of poetry, The Seventh Octave and She, as well as various compilation and single tracks. Still, nobody could have really predicted him getting his ya-ya's out with such sonic fury, let alone inviting rockers like Rick Rubin or Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers) or junglist Krust to the eye of his pure black whirlwind.
The mix keeps it interesting, if not occasionally awkward. "Om Nia Merican" is a heavy, thudding rock beast while the glassy, unstable "Untimely Meditations" barely registers above a whisper. Out of nowhere comes Krust's submariner-zap "Coded Language," Williams' earnest attempt to chart diasporas along BPMs. For all of Williams' imperfect thoughts and rock-star yows, Amethyst draws listeners into its massive, dense inertia like nothing else. Where most music today strives to bleed disaffected coolness, Amethyst reaches for the stars, earnest, unembarrassed and open-armed: "While you rhyme about being hardcore, be heartcore/What is that we do art for? " The universal truth as encoded in subversive, shiny discs or Sun Ra with mass appeal.
Hua Hsu
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