Muse Sick-N-Hour Mess Age

About

A long-misunderstood entry in Public Enemy’s decades-spanning catalog, <i>Muse Sick-N-Hour Mess Age</i> captures the band’s brilliant hybridization of organic instruments and hip-hop production. The result? A groove machine that rages like a raised fist, but funks like the Mothership. Chuck D and Flavor Flav are at their confrontational best on the back-to-back shot of “What Side You On?” and “Bedlam 13:13” (“Good enough to know no indo/Threw it out the window along with the Super Nintendo”). But the real stars are the gang vocals—equal parts Panther party and house party—and the propulsive, heavy-footed live drums of Nathaniel Townsley III. “Hitler Day,” a scathing takedown of the Columbus holiday, is a rap-rock rager that emerged right at the dawn of nu metal, while “Give It Up”—built off a shimmering piece of 1960s Stax soul—became the band’s first and only Top 40 pop hit. But the real pleasure of <i>Muse Sick-N-Hour Mess Age</i> is hearing Public Enemy getting loose and almost <i>jammy</i> at times—this is the album that finds the hardest working punk band in hip-hop getting closer to the funk breaks they once sampled. “What Kind of Power We Got?” is a long and strong hip-hop remake of James Brown’s “Soul Power,” with Chuck D playing Bobby Byrd to the always irrepressible Flavor Flav. And “Live and Undrugged, Pt. 1 & 2” takes the form of one of Brown’s own 45s: The first three-and-half minutes consist of hard rhyming before the track turns into a dizzying swarm of ad-lib, vamp, and Terminator X scratch flurrie. .

via Apple Music

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