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Artist: Common
Album: Nobody's Smiling
Label: Def Jam / Artium; 2014
Rating: 7.7
By David Drake; July 25, 2014
Common exists in sainted territory in hip-hop: the rare rapper who's appeared on "Oprah", he's earned a default level of respect and can reliably release major label albums every few years, no matter what the industry climate. For many, Common's latest album, Nobody's Smiling, will hold a polarized position in the midst of Chicago's senseless violence, a symbol of all that is right in a genre too often derided for moral depravity and/or artistic bankruptcy. Others will cynically dismiss this latest effort, as Common hasn't lived in Chicago in years but is releasing a record capitalizing on the city's newly gritty national reputation. But Common's not interested in moralism, nor trendchasing. Although he writes a familiar snapshot of Chicago, its troubles seem a catalyst for his own creativity. The album's most convincing when tackling the push-and-pull conflict between the individual and his hometown, as Common's good intentions are buoyed by memory, generosity, and attentiveness to his craft.
Looming over the album is the specter of Chicago's gun violence and the music which first brought it to our attention; Common's 2011 album The Dreamer/The Believer was released just weeks before Chief Keef hit the national radar. So Nobody's Smiling displays some idealism-drain, its black and white cover art reflecting a stripped down sound. Common and longtime producer No I.D. aren't interested in competing with the street sounds emanating from his hometown. Instead, they go for a complementary feel, with old head-friendly percussive loops and blaxploitation rhythms ("Blak Majik," "Speak My Piece," "Hustle Harder"). Common's delivery has a loose, nimble quality throughout, his words tumbling out with practiced ease. His lyrics are writerly, internal rhymes focused on a history he can recall but which seems distant now: "Have you ever heard of Black Stone around Black Stones?/ And Four CHs, Vice Lords, Stony Island on Aces/ The concrete matrix, street organizations, they gave violations, hood public relations."
Common's approach here is to intertwine his own story with his memories of Chicago in order to forge a connection to the next generation. The use of a Biggie sample on "Speak My Piece" is emblematic; when Common was an emerging artist, the young Christopher Wallace spoke powerfully to the same state of mind Chicago's street rappers wrestle with today. "7 Deadly Sins", a bonus track on Nobody's Smiling, sounds like another way to integrate a mid-'90s street feel, complete with a "Ten Crack Commandments"-esque concept and Wu-Tang-recalling beat. Throughout, Common attempts to speak to everyone, offering bits of wisdom for a new generation while contextualizing for an older, outside audience.
This attempt at generational continuity also explains why Common grants a platform for a phalanx of strong guest stars to shine. Opener "The Neighborhood" features Lil Herb, a young street rapper whose memories of his era are more freshly etched in each bar: "Used to post up on that strip, I look like a street sign/ I been out there three days and I got shot at three times." Meanwhile, West Side rapper Dreezy's verse on "Hustle Harder" argues convincingly that she might be the best bar-for-bar rapper in Chicago right now: "I could be a lady in the streets, but in the booth I pull triggers/ Shots fired, I go harder than a nigga."
Other guest artists, like Def Jam signees Vince Staples and Big Sean, acquit themselves well, providing different points of view on the record's central conflict. Big Sean tones down the usual hamminess, perhaps due to the severity of the subject matter, and catches a slick behind-the-beat flow. But Staples stands out particularly: "Lean and took a puff and then she gave it to my father/ Used to take the bullets out so I could play with the revolver/ Satan serenading ever since I was a toddler." But it's poet Malik Yusef who nearly steals the show, appearing at the end of the album's title track and spitting an evocative piece that captures the album's real central paradoxes: "Now I see how my daddy felt the dark day he discovered that black power didn't keep the lights on." "They drilling on my land but ain't no oil to be found / I might be part of the problem." He hits especially hard while engaging with wordplay in the differences between "shy" and "Chi": "Are these celebrities way too shy to be loyal to the town?"
The album's closer, "Rewind That", is one of Common's most personal records in quite some time, reflecting on the ups and downs of his relationship with No I.D. and meditating on the loss of J Dilla. He addresses his own conflicted decision to leave the city and people that so greatly shaped some of his best music. Truth is complex, and the popular manichean tensions don't map out so predictably atop "conscious" and "gangster". That's true for street rappers themselves, who have to navigate an ever-increasing divide between their lives and those of the communities who propelled them to fame. And it's true for Common, too, who had to leave his home to continue his career, and for whomnearly two decades laterfinds that the decision still weighs upon him. Nobody's Smiling is driven by the search for this common denominator. ******************************************
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