RIYL: It’s a bit hard to say, really
The idea of any 72-year-old man supervising the recording of a hip-hop record is sort of ridiculous on its face, but Bill Cosby? The guy whose beef with rap culture’s profane streak has only deepened since being immortalized in Eddie Murphy’s “Raw” more than 20 years ago? The sweatered sitcom savior and Jell-O pitchman has made a second career out of delivering cranky missives to the black community, and from a distance, Bill Cosby Presents the Cosnarati: State of Emergency looks like just another lecture about not dropping out of school, taking care of your kids, staying off drugs, and keeping your language free of all that awful filth, flarn, flarn, flarn, filth. Which it is, sort of, but here’s the thing – as a hip-hop record, State of Emergency is surprisingly sound. Okay, so it won’t win any awards for innovative production, and yes, it does include a few painful rhymes, but it’s far from the unintentionally hilarious train wreck you might expect. And even if he’s alienated some with his heavy-handed speechifying, this album reinforces the fact that his heart has always been in the right place. Still, there’s no denying that Public Enemy was pioneering socially conscious hip-hop 20 years ago – and delivering it with more passion, more style, and a more profound impact. It’s also hard, given Cosby’s career and strident reputation, to imagine who’s going to listen to this album with open enough ears to hear it for what it really is. It’s ultimately just a curiosity, albeit a well-made one; perhaps next time, Cos can use a few name-brand MCs to get his point across. (Turtle Head 2009)
