Eligh - Beneath The Sea feat. Zumbi (of Zion I), Scarub

15th song on Eligh's 2010 album "Grey Crow".

When I worked as a critic for a hip hop magazine in 2010, I wrote a long feature article about this album. And it started with the statement, that people who had already closed their books on "The best Hip Hop album of 2010" should better re-open them. And my opinion hasn't changed one bit.

"Grey Crow" is an insanely good album from start to finish. There is not one song that disappoints. I get the impression, sometimes all ingredients come together for a "perfect storm" and then something like this happens.

Eligh is one of the founding members of the famous LA rap crew "Living Legends", who were pretty successful in the early 2000s. When he made Grey Crow he had just battled his way back from a nasty drug addiction. And when you listen to the lyrics, you will hear a very well reflected artist who seems to have just figured out what things are important in life, after wasting many years with bullshit. But the lyrics are not the only thing that make this album as great as it is.

Grey Crow is especially strong when it comes to the production. Eligh produced almost the entire album by himself and he really excelled himself here. For the work of an underground rap artist many of the songs are almost unbelievably enjoyable. The album is very melodic, melancholic at times, and it never gets even slighty tedious. There's always something going on, may it be Eligh himself; or singer Paris Hayes or one of the many other great feature artists (Aesop Rock, Brother Ali, Zumbi or Eligh's Living Legends buddies The Grouch, Scarub and Luckyiam); or may it be the beautifully arranged, very diverse beats; or the atmospheric bits in between songs that make the whole album feel like it's trying to fight its way out of a drug-induced feverish dream.

And while you wouldn't be able to bump The Grouch in your car with your non-hip-hoppy friends, the songs on Grey Crow have the potential to satisfy even them. Don't get me wrong: Your friends are fine, but undergroundy rap music isn't for anyone... obviously. Oh, and don't get me wrong on this neither: The Grouch has released plenty of good music and if you have a lot of time on your hands, feel free to check all of that out. But The Grouch's music, especially his early work (95-03), is for Hip Hop purists. "Simple", slow, lowfi beats and a guy rapping - that's it.

But not Grey Crow. If you - until now - don't know if underground rap music is for you: start with this album.

Oh yeah: I decided to connect the Intro and the first song "Angel Of Death" and upload them as one song. The intro is simply a perfect build-up for what comes afterwards. With that intro infront of it, the second songs first few seconds always make me shiver in excitement - even after almost 15 years.

Oh yeah 2: Eligh recently released a new album called "Halo Boy". The artwork is clearly referencing Grey Crow, I even thought it might be some kind of musical successor to Grey Grow, so I was pretty excited to give it a listen. But the album is rather dark and heavy-hearted. The whole joyful- and playfulness of Grey Crow is completely missing, instead there's minimalistic piano or guitar instrumentals by producer Aloeight. Still good music tho, but not for me at the moment.

Support the artist: https://www.elighmusic.com/

I do not own any rights to this, I just see it as my duty to upload the rap music gems no one knows about.