Cannibal Ox – “Cold Vein, the ” – [Definitive Jux]

Two poets from Harlem with angry, intelligent, beautiful word-ism. They craft serious urban epics with their deep story-telling. It’s so far beyond the cliches that pass for rap these days that it’s not even the same genre. El-P, ex-Company Flow, assembled the backing tracks, and they are perfect for what’s going on here. The beats are sick, hung over, lurching, with sliced-and-diced jazz riffs and sounds we have never heard before getting piled up thicker and thicker until they’re strong enough to support the weight of what the MCs are laying down. It’s the end of the rap world as we know it, and nobody feels fine.