Brother Ali has many gifts. He's a great lyricist, is comfortable in his own skin which seems to elude even the most popular MC's sometimes, and he has one of the most soulful voices in hip-hop. Unfortunately, Brother Ali is a white albino from Minneapolis which leaves him in hip-hop limbo. Besides his cultish following in Minneapolis, not many really know what to make of this man. But when listening to Us, Brother Ali's latest release, you can't help but think how all those physical and regional differences combined with his unquestionable talent has molded him into one of the leading voices of underground hip-hop.
Listening to this album is personal. By the end of the album you feel like your inside Brother Ali's world as he spends the entire album describing everything from how he parties, to race relations, to buying a new house. By addressing such a wide range of topics Brother Ali does a great job of avoiding some of the common pitfalls of underground rap. His album doesn't get bogged down by a monotonous theme that so many underground albums fall victim to. If he talks about race relations, the next he's talking about how great life is after the birth of his second child, and then right after he goes into telling the story of a rape victim. This gives the album it's honest feel and buy the end I even forget that he's a white albino from Minneapolis, home of the most God forsaken baseball stadium known to man. Despite the Metrodome sabotaging the Tigers, we still escaped with one and now we leave without looking back.
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