Here comes Crown of the Grim Reaperz with one of the better Hip Hop albums of 2014. A lot of French producers are putting out dope releases right now and perhaps what makes Pieces to the Puzzle stand out above the rest is Crown’s diverse and international selection of features. Where many European producers these days prefer to only feature American emcees, here we have UK’s Caxton Press on What the World Needs Now, some of France’s best emcees like Dadoo from KDD and ATK, Belgium’s Scylla and even Paloalto from Korea!
Of course there’s also the great US features that Grim Reaperz have become known for over a series of EPs and releases, including PMD, Main Flow, Reks, El Da Sensei, Grand Agent, Rasco and many more. When first playing the record I was struck by the high quality of the sound, particularly the bass, as there’s something happening here which (although I am no ‘sound expert’) I can hear the mixing and mastering is a cut above many of the records I have bought recently and this usually makes me turn it up really loud.
This is not an album you will listen to only once. Linguistically there is a lot happening here and it will take multiple listens to (fully?) understand everything that’s going on. Luckily Crown has created more than just ‘beats with raps on them’ and musically the whole thing seems to come together, a little bit like each track is a piece of a large and complex puzzle….
I highly recommend you grab the wax now before it’s too late.
Album review by Esh Empowered by http://ibmcs.wordpress.com/
Esh
Latest posts by Esh (see all)
- Review: Innate & EP ‘Such as I’ — LP — July 7, 2016
- Review: 1–2‑3–4‑5 Wake up! By Djar One Ft Carpetface — December 17, 2015
- Album Review: Crown — Pieces to the Puzzle (@crownprod) — May 25, 2015
