Holy Terror

Still, the connections are there: Reality-based and race- baited, the Last Poets prefigured every rhymer from Arrested Development to Ice-T. It's no surprise, then, that longstanding name checks from rap statesmen like Afrika Bambaata and Chuck D are cashed in on Holy Terror, the group's Bill Laswell-produced comeback featuring original Poets Umar Bin Hassan and Abiodun Oyewole. From "Invocation," where Oyewole calls on rappers to "get back on track," to "Last Rites," where he laments "the absence of a movement" and promises to "change that," the Poets are out to assume their long-vacant role as father rappers--or perhaps as the creators of what we might call adult hip-hop.

Despite Holy Terror's thematic consistency, the record plays like a mesh of two separate solo albums. Oyewole hangs closer to the original sound by framing his poems in melodic chants and Conga percussion, as in "Black Rage" and "If We Only Knew." Hassan, meanwhile, trades off with rapper Melle Mel to the P-funk grooves of Bootsy Collins and Bernie Worrell on tracks like "Homesick" and "Funk." The older style is the better, though the words and vision of both men are clearly timeless.--Roni Sarig