The Sun Kissed My Naked Soul

Ami Taf Ra featuring Kamasi Washington “How I Became A Madman”

Ami Tan Ra may be singing about how she became a madman but in the context of this song’s arrangement, she sounds exceptionally grounded and calm in the midst of chaos. The music is groovy but the drumming is busy and fidgety, amping up the frantic energy and emotive extremes of every other sound in the mix besides her voice. She sounds so centered and certain that her lyrics come across as wisdom from beyond time, which I suppose can seem like a sort of madness. Or maybe “madness” in this song is just about trying to obscure something important within you from others. The most resonant moment of the song for me is when she sings this: “I found the freedom of loneliness and the safety from being understood / for those who understand us enslave something in us.”

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Ghostface Killah featuring Raekwon, GZA, Method Man, Reek Da Villain, and Pillz “The Trial”

They still got it. “The Trial” is a sketch in song form, with Ghostface and Raekwon as defendants standing before judge Method Man, with lesser-known rappers Reek Da Villain and Pillz as lawyers. The premise is fun, but the song mostly works because the rappers sound great bouncing lines off each other, the drama is well paced, and the lyrical detail is as vivid as you’d expect from any of these Wu guys in their prime. I particularly like how Method Man and GZA are deployed here – Meth’s extra-weathered voice sounding gruff and authoritative as the judge, and the wise, grounded quality of GZA’s voice well-suited to delivering cold truth as the court stenographer.

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