The beats range from loud and extravagant Middle Eastern-sounding ones to simple beats that contain not much more than what sounds like a clicking of drumsticks and a one-note bassline, but Mos Def flows over all of them beautifully and sometimes even weirdly but interestingly sings over them and ad libs on the choruses.
Mos Def and his featured artists delve into topics like poverty in the Black community, the Iraq War, exploitation of workers by their bosses, romance, morality and values in the Black community, taking on the elites of the American system and the problems that can happen if people only pursue fame and fortune in the rap game. From the very start, it is obvious that this will be a political project, as the first song opens with a clip of a Malcolm X speech.
The album features such other hip hop greats like Slick Rick and Talib Kweli, who was one half of the immortalized duo “Black Star” with Mos Def in 1998. After a period of time in which he pursued acting and writing, legendary Brooklyn-born MC Mos Def (who now goes by the name Yasiin Bey) returned to the music world with his critically acclaimed and unique album “The Ecstatic” in 2009.
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