El-P - "I'll Sleep When You're Dead" Era

[jaxxalude]

El-P Reveals LP Tracklist, Single With Trent Reznor

El-P's previously reported, guest-heavy new album, I'll Sleep When You're Dead, comes out March 20 on Def Jux. The album finally has a tracklist, which is below in all its detailed glory.

Vocals by the Mars Volta, Cat Power, Trent Reznor, Aesop Rock, Slug! Guitar by Matt Sweeney of Chavez/Superwolf/Zwan! Keyboards by the dude from Glassjaw! "Intro Moog Liberation played by Wilder Zoby"!

The first single, "Flyentology", features Trent Reznor and comes out digitally via iTunes on February 20. "EMG" is the B-side, and Adult Swim created a video for "Flyentology".

El-P will kick off a short tour on March 16 in Austin at the Def Jux South by Southwest showcase, which also doubles as his CD release party.

Tracklist:

01 "Tasmanian Pain Coaster"
With Omar Rodriguez-Lopez & Cedric Bixler-Zavala of the Mars Volta
Produced by El-P
Intro Moog Liberation played by Wilder Zoby
Additional guitar by Matt Sweeney
Cuts by Mr. Dibbs

02 "Smithereens (Stop Cryin')"
Produced by El-P
Additional vocals by Hangar 18
Cuts by Mr. Dibbs

03 "Up All Night"
Produced by El-P

04 "EMG"
Produced by El-P
Cuts by Big Wiz

05 "Drive"
Produced by El-P

06 "Dear Sirs"
Produced by El-P

07 "Run the Numbers"
With Aesop Rock
Produced by El-P
Cuts by Mr. Dibbs
Additional Moog Liberation by Wilder Zoby

08 "Habeas Corpses (Draconian Love)"
With Cage
Produced by El-P
Cuts by Mr. Dibbs
Buzuq played by Daniel Kaufman
Sergeant played by Mr. Len

09 "The Overly Dramatic Truth"
Produced by El-P
Additional keys by Darryl Palumbo
Additional vocals by Camu Tao

10 "Flyentology"
With Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails
Produced by El-P
Additional production by Trent Reznor

11 "No Kings"
Produced by El-P
Additional vocals by Tame One

12 "The League of Extraordinary Nobodies"
Produced by El-P
Additional vocals by Joey Raia, Slug, and Murs

13 "Poisenville Kids No Wins/ Reprise (This Must Be Our Time)"
With Chan Marshall of Cat Power
Produced by El-P
Additional guitar by Kareem Bunton
Additional keys on "Reprise (This Must Be Our Time)" by Ikey of the Mars Volta

Dates:

03-16 Austin, TX - Emo's (SXSW Def Jux showcase) *#
03-22 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom *^
03-23 Chicago, IL - Logan Square Auditorium
03-25 San Francisco, CA - The Mezzanine *^
03-26 Los Angeles, CA - Troubadour
04-27 Indio, CA - Empire Polo Field (Coachella)

* with Aesop Rock
# with Cage, Rob Sonic
^ with Mr. Dibbs

==============================//===================================

Better not get too caught up on the guests, as previous experiences have taught me.

[jaxxalude]

INTHEMIX

El-P - I'll Sleep When You're Dead
Created On March 7th, 2007 by sickbuoy

El-P, aka El-Producto or Jaime Meline, is a man with an impressive résumé. Not only is he a rapper and producer, but he is also the co-founder, owner and CEO of influential indie hip hop label Definitive Jux. The Brooklyn native burst onto the scene as a 17 year old with Company Flow, on the Rawkus label, before leaving to start Def Jux. At the helm of seminal hip hop albums such as Cannibal Ox’s 2001 release ‘The Cold Vein’ and featuring in releases by DJ Krush, Aesop Rock, Murs, Cage, Mr Lif, Prefuse 73 and Del the Funky Homosapien; El-P released his own debut album entitled ‘Fantastic Damage’ to critical acclaim in 2002. Several other releases followed, including an instrumental album and a jazz collaboration with pianist Matthew Shipp. But it is his second solo album, ‘I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead’, that people have been waiting four long years for. And upon listening to his record, the wait has been well worth it.

The first track ‘Tasmanian Pain Coaster’ features Omar-Rodriguez-Lopez & Cedric Bixler-Zavala from the Mars Volta on vocals and guitar, and is a tour de force from start to finish. Heavy, gritty beats combined with rock instrumentation, and you just know you’re in for something good. The album features additional guest appearances by Def Jux alumni Cage, Aesop Rock, Slug & Murs. Aesop’s joint ‘Run the Numbers’ keeps up the overall energy of the album, keeping it raw and hard, while the Cage track ‘Habeas Corpses (Draconian Love)’, sounds like it could have come straight out of a teen slasher horror flick or zombie movie (a good one like 28 Days Later, not a crap one like House of Wax).

‘The League of Extraordinary Nobodies’ is a creepy little number, in a good way. Featuring Joey Raia, Slug and Murs, it becomes clear that El-P is the master of mood music. Effortlessly able to create an atmosphere while at the same time fashioning good music is difficult, more often than not artists experiment too much and sacrifice one for the other, but not El-P. It’s perfection all the way. The final track ‘Poisenville Kids No Wins/Reprise (This Must Be Our Time)’ is a seven-minute opus of dark beats layered with guitar from Kareem Bunton, ikey from The Mars Volta on keys and the ethereal voice of Cat Power.

But the track everyone is bound to be talking about is ‘Flyentology’, featuring Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails helping out on vocals and production. Listening to this track reminds me of a circus freak show. Not content with simply collaborating with a rock artist to put together a shit track (think Jay-Z/Linkin Park), El-P and Reznor fuse hip hop and rock together to create what is arguably the strongest track on the album. Even the tracks that don’t feature guest artists work here. There isn’t really one weak song on the album. ‘EMG’ features futuristic drum sampled beats; while ‘Dear Sirs’ shows how bright El-P can lyrically shine on his own. “And drugs no longer taunt me, flooze around my conscience / and every woman meeting rapist is securely in their coffin / every open hydrant in a Brooklyn time summer moment, is opened up by cops and thrown down into an ocean…”

It is obvious that El-P is in control here. This is his album; these are his rhymes, his beats, and his production. El-P has always been at the forefront of independent music. Which makes sense that this promo release I’m reviewing has some sort measure to combat piracy. My only gripe is that every few minutes there is a voiceover saying telling me who this copy belongs to. I know that if that were my name on the album there’s no way I’d be leaking it. All in all, El-P has done it again. Dope beats, strong rhymes and top-notch production. It’s only March, but ‘I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead’ is definitely in the running for one of the best releases of the year. I just hope there won’t be another four-year wait before the El-P drops his next album.

[allflowerz]

dope, gotta check it out, sure it'll be real interesting

[jaxxalude]

ARTIST DIRECT


i'll sleep when you're dead - album reviews

After producing Cannibal Ox’s indie hip-hop classic The Cold Vein, Definitive Jux head El-P outdid himself with his own 2002 solo debut, Fantastic Damage. With its densely layered, atmospheric production and lyrics to match, El-Producto revealed himself as a mad genius perhaps too well-read on Philip K. Dick—anger, paranoia, and impending doom emanated throughout the album.

After the experimental departure of High Water (a project with Matthew Shipp), El-P returns on his third full-length, I'll Sleep When You're Dead, with soundscapes that are every bit as intricate, heavy, and ominous as expected. "Tasmanian Pain Coaster," featuring the Mars Volta, melds layered drums, bass, piano, guitar, and spooky samples to create a densely packed apocalyptic groove and clatter that's little like much else in hip-hop. "Habeas Corpus (Draconian Love)," is a twisted, dystopian tale of love and heartbreak between an executioner and a female prisoner, and "The Overly Dramatic Truth" sees El-P laying himself bare as he describes a doomed relationship he just can't quit. On both tracks, El-P is at his least wordy, but also his most lucid and poignant.

The album features the obligatory Def Jux cameos from the likes of Aesop Rock, Cage, and others; plus a rather inscrutable (and unsuccessful) appearance from Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor on "Flyentology." Better executed is the collaboration with Cat Power’s Chan Marshall, who offers up the lovely vocals that dot the epic closer "Poisenville Kids No Wins / Reprise (This Must Be Our Time), which sees El-P wrestling with the painful idea that we're all in this together: "How the f*ck do you explain your own self-destruction and still remain trusting?" Fierce and focused, El-P has dropped one of the first truly significant hip-hop albums of 2007.

- Justin Charles

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INDEPENDENT

El-P
I'll Sleep When You're Dead, DEFINITIVE JUX

By AndyGill



For a once revolutionary form of musical expression, hip-hop has proven remarkably easy to emasculate, a neutering only made possible by the eager co-operation of record labels, radio and MTV in promoting the dead-end culture of gangsta-rap at the expense of all other rap strains.

But look a little deeper then the headline-friendly posturing of death profiteers like 50 Cent, and you'll find a whole subculture trying to reclaim hip-hop as a more varied expression of contemporary life. Definitive Jux, the label helmed by former Company Flow mastermind El Producto, has been at the forefront of this movement for several years now, releasing groundbreaking albums in which anger and intelligence are combined to devastating effect. As a producer, El-P is the only true heir of Public Enemy's pioneering Bomb Squad team, creating jagged, cacophonous backing tracks whose samples, scratches, synths and breakbeats collide with a weird, chaotic logic vividly evocative of the urgent, angry, fragmented quality of New York streetsound. In places here, it dissolves into little more than a brittle barrage of beats with a patina of chaos, a sound both repulsive and magnetic.

He's equally uncompromising and confrontational as a rapper, taking mighty scimitar-swipes at everything from New York traffic, the music industry and old girlfriends to God, dangerous kids, and scientists who can't be trusted. Along the way, he offers a damning indictment of his own culture, dissing MCs "who went from battle raps to gun talk like we ain't noticed the change yet".

But although El-P clearly has a fiery intelligence and a bottomless fund of lyrical bile, there are lines poking out of his diatribes which reveal a sensitivity quite shocking in these surroundings, such as his admission in "Smithereens" that "Everything's exactly as it seems, and it seems that I am crying", and his revelation in the dystopian prison fantasy "Habeas Corpses" that "I'm the first to touch her without gloves on / She's the first to kiss me without crying".

Joining El-P in his bilious crusade are Def Jux stalwarts including Mr Lif and Aesop Rock, alongside rock guitarists from Zwan and The Mars Volta on "Tasmanian Pain Coaster", Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor on "Flyentology", the sarcastic dressing-down of an ignorant God, and most surprising of all, the soothing tone of Cat Power, who brings a femme fatale charm to "Poisenville Kids No Wins". Not what you might expect from a hip-hop album, but this is no ordinary hip-hop album.

DOWNLOAD THIS: 'Smithereens', 'The Overly Dramatic Truth', 'Flyentology', 'Run The Numbers'

[jaxxalude]

NME

El-P

I'll Sleep When You're Dead

El-P is the grand master of indie hip-hop. As a member of avant garde New York rap crew Company Flow he pretty much set the blueprint for weird, underground geek rap. His music has always been dense, dark and perverse and this is no different. The mistake often made by indie writers when approaching these hellish, paranoia-ridden swampscapes is to say that the rapper's influences lie beyond hip-hop - within the more critic-friendly genres of post-rock or art-punk. Which is bollocks: this record is pure rap. Like the lolloping darkside synths of 'Overly Dramatic Truth'? Then spin your RZA Records at half pace. Care for 'EMG''s cut-glass electronica? It's Eric B marinating in napalm. Adore El-P's manic nasal delivery? Check out Cypress Hill and the cracked-voice of Ghostface Killah. If you enjoy using your brain rather than listening to it fizzle to the strains of Virgin Radio, then buy this.

Alex Miller

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PITCHFORK

El-P
I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead
[Def Jux; 2007]
Rating: 8.0

Fantastic Damage, El-P's solo debut, was one of the first great albums released in post-9/11 America. It was tense and paranoid, and El-P seemed to be peering over his shoulder at the gathering storm. The album's production, blending waves of cacophony over broken rhythms, was similarly bleak. And while Fan Dam didn't anticipate everything-- who, aside from perhaps Donald Rumsfeld, could've foreseen the sanctification of torture as a tool of "freedom"-- it did give form to our own feelings of dread and helplessness.

Though I'll Sleep When You're Dead is (slightly) more textured and melodic than its predecessor, El-P's production is still amongst the most jarring in hip-hop, and his themes and shading remain pitched to black, haunted by the prospect of a dystopian near-future: Cigarettes are extinguished on wet palms, prisoners are raped before execution, and El-P-- our crazed, sometimes indecipherable narrator-- sticks his head out of a hoopde, screaming "freedom is mine." In this world, as in ours, we're coasting in the fast lane "with doom and disease." Like El-Producto says, "The whole design got my mind crying."

"Tasmanian Pain Coaster", the album's first track, kicks off with a sample from Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. "Do you think that if you were falling in space that you would slow down after a while or go faster and faster?" the first voice (Moria Kelly's Donna Hayward) asks. "Faster and faster," heroine Laura Palmer replies. "For a long time, you wouldn't feel anything. And you'd burst into fire, forever."

El-P spends 13 tracks exploring the freefalling fatalism of that quote. America is ablaze and El-P is fucked up from the floor up: "Why should I be sober when God is so clearly dusted out his mind?" the rapper asks on "Tasmanian". The reply never comes, and he stumbles along like Rory Cochrane, too dazed to be angry or to put all the pieces together. On "Drive", he talks of a kid who "fuel injected a speed ball," before later admitting with a wink "my triple-A card has one too many initials."

The album works best at these moments, when it's sneering into the abyss and spitting out gallows humor. "I stood up for the God's of ore mining/ In a military humvee with no bullet-proof siding," El-P raps on "Drive". Afterwards, a distant voice chimes in, "sorry about that, guys" as robotic backing vocals emerge from a miasma of corrosive, clunky rhythms to provide a mocking refrain of sorts. Elsewhere, lead-single "Smithereens" begins with a snippet of what could be a sunny, Bob Dorough track, before a voice interjects, "Bring me the dramatic intro machine," and squishy horror synths introduce one of El-P's most caustic songs to date.

But perhaps the most explicit instance of the album's dark humor comes at the end of "Habeas Corpses", which imagines El-P and guest rapper Cage as workers aboard a futuristic prison ship. Their task is to "facilitate the end" for the incarcerated. (From the gunshots sprinkled throughout, it's easy to imagine what that would entail.) "It's almost romantic," Cage comments, but El-P doesn't share the enthusiasm. He's fallen in love with prisoner #247681Z, and his job is suddenly full of contradiction and nuance. He tries to escape, but of course escape is illusionary and temporary.

"Habeas Corpus" is similar in spirit to Fantastic Damage's "Stepfather Factory", and provides a makeshift metaphor for our own country's desire for vindication and liberation. But, as the song fades, El-P is unwilling to cop to his own seriousness, and the track fades with him and Cage laughing off the drama they've just conjured.

The jaded pose is a good look for El, and when the album tries to emote, such as on "The Overly Dramatic Truth", it falls flat on its face. The song is full of cringe-worthy lines such as "you deserve the ignorance and bliss that I wish I still had," and is too emo for its own good. But when El-P sticks to what he knows - chronicling the grime - I'll Sleep When You're Dead is every bit as good as its predecessor. It's a scary, difficult album, but one well suited for our times.

-Sam Chennault

[jaxxalude]

Rob Harvilla declares that there's No Sleep For Brooklyn at the Village Voice.

[jaxxalude]

NOBODY SMILING


El-P - I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead
Album Review by: John Burnett

The average hip-hop fan has not heard of El-Producto (El-P) or the label he co-owns Definitive Juxtaposition (Definitive Jux). If you know Company Flow then you know El-P. While on Rawkus Records, El-P helped Company Flow attain critical acclaim then bounced because “creative differences” (whatever the hell that means) and started his own label, Def Jux. From here, the BK native dropped a couple LPs, worked on other’s projects and even managed a recent collabo with Adult Swim called Definitive Swim. March 20th El-P will drop 'I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead'; the opposite of your typical snap your fingers and step type shit.

“Tasmanian Pain Coaster”

Whoa. This is not average dope dealer intro track. There are a lot of strings and heavy drums in the production; odd lyrics but vivid descriptions. It’s a fusion of rock and hip-hop. If that ain’t your thing abandon ship now.

“Smithereens”

El-P begins describing BK city blocks then tells how hip-hop went from battle raps to guns as far as subject content. El-P tends to rhyme less about the literal and dwells on the abstract. His stanzas are packed with words and his flows are rapid fire. The production suggests anarchy.

“Up All Night”

He continues with production that’s far from the norm. Producto deals with a range of emotions over a high tempo beat.

“EMG”

Drinking piss, molotov cocktails and cutting reverend’s throats are just a few of the bizarre topics that appear on this track. The production is like “Rock the Bells” meets weird rock shit but El’s mentioning of BDP illustrates his hip hop reverence.

“Drive”

El creatively uses cars and the topic of driving to maneuver through seemingly random rambling. Just when I was about to hit the FFWD button, the metaphor became clear; very clever song.

“Dear Sirs”

This effort is a statement of how, basically, shit is fucked up right now; decent social commentary over guitars.

“Run the Numbers”

I couldn’t really get into this track, but towards the end once the track slows, El uses numbers to assist in narrative; again very clever.

“Habeas Corpses (draconian love)”

This one is a science fiction love story about El falling in love on a prison ship. El’s story-telling ability shines as well as his liking of things other-worldly.

“The Overly Dramatic Truth”

El, in his very unique and bizarre way, deals with love talking about a dysfunctional relationship and not being able to leave the situation.

“Flyentology”

Duke lost me on this one. Skip.

“No Kings”

This is one of my favorite tracks on the album. The title of the track refers to El’s stance on NYC’s throne holders. He’s spitting hard on the track though.

'I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead' is an odd, creative, bizarre, dense LP. El-P can certainly rhyme. His bar/stanzas are thick with similes and metaphors amongst other things and force the listener to pay attention or allow the tracks to float over their head. The music is unable to be categorized threading that thin line between hardcore hip-hop, hard rock and alternative. It was a little bit too weird for my tastes though. The outlandish lyrics took attention away from the ingenuity and the high paced beats made it difficult to digest his content. If you want something that’s far from the status quo, fuck with it. It’s what that cat on the bus rocking the black hoody in the summer with pale skin will be listening to or the cat itching to rebel or the Hip-Hop fan who’s tired of bullshit. You get the point.

[jaxxalude]

You know you've made it into Hip-Hop Heaven when Chuck-D interviews you! The people from donewaiting take you to the necessary audio links right here.

And you know what? Even XXLmag.com's bloggers are in on the action. Bol crowns it The Second Great Rap Album of 2007! Meanwhile, Tara Henley tells us how El Producto's lyrics have always done some Fantastic Damage on her.

[jaxxalude]

#78, with 11 000 copies sold. SMASH!