Albums of the Year # 21 Tha God Fahim & Your Old Droog - The Wolf on Wall Street

 I think the only Hip Hop album on this list. But it's a very good one:

In 1994 I spent a year in Warsaw. In the centre of town on Marzalkowska Street outside the main department stores, hawkers use to sell bootleg cassettes of the latest releases. I bought quite a few over the course of the year but my most memorable purchase of was definitely Nas's debut album Illmatic.

It was and still is a fabulous album, probably the last Hip Hop album I truly fell for before I pushed the genre to one side in terms of my tastes and focused elsewhere. But I got several years of play out of that particular cassette and then replaced it on CD and still later on vinyl. It's what they refer to in romantic affairs as a keeper. All urban noir cool, slippery and enigmatic beats and an atmosphere you could slice with a knife. 

Twenty five years on and Hip Hop doesn't play a large part in my life. I go back to my Public Enemy, Tribe Called Quest. Digable Planets and  De La Soul records sometimes. I have a healthy respect for Wu Tang and his Clan but I barely ever listen to them anymore. Kanye, Eminem even Kendrick don't appeal .Hey, I'm 55. I don't really care to hear the 'N' word every other sentence. or indulge young men's fantasies of blowing one another away. Yes, I know I'm generalising and probably missing great stuff but I won't lose any sleep about it.

So it was with great pleasure that I chanced upon Tha Wolf on Wall Street. Tha God Fadim and Your Old Droog's fabulous collaboration from earlier this year. It's wicked! Sorry, did tell you I was 55. But it is really great. All Liquid Swords inventive samples and odd lyrical slants which seem to focus as much on what you might say or be exposed to during a visit to your therapist as what's going down on the corner.

This record is addictive. It casts shadows. It creeps up on you in a couple of plays. It's only eight tracks long so it's a moot point as to whether it's actually an album or should be referred to as an EP instead of as an album. I'm calling it an album anyhow, a lot of Hip Hop albums are too long for my tastes anyhow and this is just right, like baby bear's porridge.

The God Fahim and Your Old Droog circle and rap off each other with great wit and poise. The rhythms and loops are dope. I admit freely that I'm not particularly fluent in this argot and it's probably for the best. But I like this. It strikes me as a slick, inventive and enlightened album. Strikes me as another keeper. Such a spooky and soulful record.