The Streets

If you've been hanging around here long enough you probably realize that I rarely, if ever, get excited for modern rap or hip hop. Hopefully that makes my endorsement of Mike Skinner's latest album, Everything Is Borrowed (amazon) (itunes), even more meaningful. Seriously, this album is quite amazing. Mike's trademark Brit vocals slide through rhymes not yet dreamed up by most of his contemporaries and on this album he lays them across his best musical work to date. Twenty years from now, when your children are just starting to listen to your lame old music, when they stumble upon The Streets this is the album they will listen to over and over again.

mp3 : The Streets - Everything Is Borrowed
mp3 : The Streets - The Strongest Person I Know

I have always been impressed with Mike Skinner and the way that he grafts together stunning melodies and brilliantly fluid rhymes. On this album it seems as if he's taken it up a full three notches. Where some of his previous albums could be pigeon holed into the Brit Rap niche, this album stands out, tall and proud, as a true landmark in a field of ever expanding rap mediocrity.