Killer Mike - MICHAEL (2023) Hi Res

Killer Mike would rather be contradictory than one-dimensional: he's advocated for both socialist causes and self-sufficient Black capitalism, campaigned for progressive icon Bernie Sanders and broken bread with conservative Georgia governor Brian Kemp, and seems constantly torn on and off the mic between opening haters' minds and putting their brains to sleep. But with Michael, the Atlanta rapper's most personal and autonomously definitive album since his solo debut Monster 20 years earlier, the son of a policeman father and a mother who trafficked cocaine navigates the more personal and formative influences in his life that led him to his status as an outspoken one-man multitude. Mike reveals himself as someone whose upfront lyrical frankness and high-displacement-muscle-car-V8-engine of a voice belies deeper complications in his perspective an ongoing process that reckons with the burden of what he owes people. For his mother and grandmother, both deceased and paid moving tribute to in "Motherless," what he owes is everything his empathy, his insight, his ability to be a strong parent. For his detractors, "Talkin Dat SHIT!" owes them a verbal beating, not just invoking but channeling Three 6 Mafia and UGK as he personifies the G-as-activist ("you a leech, I'm a leader"). He gives his musical collaborators Andre 3000 and Future elevating the next-phase utopianism of "Scientists & Engineers," Young Thug wringing both impassioned intensity and reflective quiet to his triplet flow on "RUN," El-P holding forth like a welcome guest in his Run the Jewels partner's home on "Don't Let the Devil" the kind of free reign that only comes with the confidence of a vet who doesn't fear or even care about the possibility of being shown up. The production by No I.D. plays to the church pews, scoring straight-up sermons before driving souls to the polls, and the Chicago beatmaker's gospel/R&B inflections are just Atlanta enough to complete what few locally rooted details Mike leaves out. And what does Mike owe himself? Going by the impassioned soul-searching of "Shed Tears," the answer is a reckoning, a catharsis, an acknowledgement of the pain that made him even when it hurts to recall. Mike has stayed angry enough to challenge power and idealistic enough to believe those in power can be moved by his presence but with a presence like his, it's not easy to doubt him.