Common & Pete Rock
The Auditorium Vol. 1
★★★★
LOMA VISTA
FOR CAREER LONGEVITY, productivity and consistency alone, few in hip-hop can match Lonnie Rashid Lynn, AKA Common. In the early ’90s, as the genre was engulfed by bloody East Coast/West Coast beefs, he rose from the Midwest as Chicago’s conscious-rap standard bearer. He’s played many roles – activist, lover man, eclectic soulquarian, guardian of hip-hop’s integrity – always bringing a humble ‘Everyman’ wisdom to bear.
His fifteenth LP finds the 52-year-old a hip-hop elder, a concept unthinkable when he first picked up the mike – when rappers’ careers were all-too-easily snuffed out by the withering of a trend or the pulling of a trigger. But now over half-a-century old, rap is no longer the sole preserve of hip young gunslingers; masterpieces from Danny Brown and Billy Woods last year proved hip-hop’s DNA-chain of ‘beats, rhymes and life’ a fine vehicle for the more complex and insoluble challenges that come with age.
The Auditorium Vol. 1 fits that brief well, though its midlife crises are tempered by a profound optimism that is very much Common’s brand. On opener Dreamin’, he’s mourning the departed – best friend J Dilla, still keenly missed two decades on, along with more recent losses like Trugoy of De La Soul – but also drawing inspiration from heroes like Martin Luther King Jr and Nelson Mandela, declaring, “When I touch dreams/They become things”. Spirituality is a recurrent theme, though he’s never preachy; Stellar views earthly worries from a cosmic perspective, while the meditative A GOD (There Is) finds him sharing his praise with partner Jennifer Hudson. The universe’s agonisingly slow arc towards justice is another constant, fellow elder Posdnuos counselling for life as marathon rather than sprint on the marvellous When The Sun Shines Again, while the meditative We’re On Our Way urges the people on, over Curtis Mayfield’s We’ve Only Just Begun.
Pete Rock, another hip-hop elder, produces throughout (following previous foils Dilla, Kanye West, Karriem Riggins and Robert Glasper). The pairing is inspired, Rock lifting from deep cuts by soul and funk greats and turning golden-age rap hooks into grooves to establish a vibe that’s warm, joyful and nostalgic like a Southside cookout. His hypnotic loops leaven weightier texts like Fortunate and match So Many People’s musing on fate and destiny to a beat subtle but heavy enough to drive its point home.
Common sounds energised throughout, bouncing back from the darkness of his A Beautiful Revolution albums to celebrate black joy as well as to bemoan black pain. Fielding love songs, existential ruminations and anthems of solidarity and resistance, The Auditorium Vol. 1 finds rap’s self-proclaimed James Baldwin sermonising in the key of life on its every glory and struggle, offering hope amid the darkness and remaining a voice of mature wisdom in a rudderless world. It’s one of his very best.
The Auditorium Vol. 1 is out now on Loma Vista.
Listen/Buy: Spotify | Apple Music | Amazon | Rough Trade
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