Wiley - Evolve or Be Extinct

Grime. Essentially dubstep meets rap, invented by our friends in Britain. Dubstep was their baby, too, actually. I have recently just found grime in the last two years or so. My first experience of dubstep was around the second semester of my freshman year in college, but I was exposed to British rap much, much earlier, when I was in either second, third, fourth, or fifth grade. i can't remember. It was The Streets' first album "Original Pirate Material", which is, in my opinion, perfect in every sense of the word. Sadly, none of The Streets' other albums were as good as his debut, but I digress. This is about Wiley, considered the godfather of grime, and his eighth album, "Evolve or Be Extinct".

This is both the easiest and hardest record to get into, regardless of whether you are familiar with grime or Wiley, or not. It is a whopping 22 tracks long, which is roughly an hour's worth of music. At the same time, though, the beats are smooth and catchy, and the lyrics are whip smart, even when they're silly. Especially then.


Be warned: if you have never listened to grime before but you want to get into it, listen to this record in intervals. It is monster record that requires time and patience to digest. It is quite long, and the last thing you want to do is listen to the album just to get it over with. I'm not saying every track is perfect...on the contrary, some tracks are better than others, for sure. But each song deserves a chance, because they all comprise the album. And this album is quite good.


REVIEW RATING:
★★★★★