Even by underground hip-hop standards,
the Shapeshifters are a truly strange crew. For one thing, double-CD sets are usually the province of megastars like
Biggie Smalls or
Tupac Shakur, not underground hip-hop artists, who routinely shy away from such excesses. For another,
the Shapeshifters eschew the usual jazzy beats that most indie artists love, replacing them with deliberately spacy, atmospheric electronics, heavily processed into something that sounds downright psychedelic, with occasional samples of ambient noises (like dogs barking) and swirling sound collages to add to the disorientation. (There's even a straight-ahead thrash metal cut, "Gen X Oot All.") It's their lyrics and flow, however, that really stand out.
Circus, the lead MC, has a flow similar to
Del tha Funkee Homosapien, but with a snotty, smirky edge, and his lyrics are full of bizarre similes, allegations, alliterations, and jokes. Even
Sole of
Antipop Consortium, who makes a guest appearance, comes off as relatively sane amid all the idiosyncratic music. It's all a bit much to take over the course of two discs, and
Circus' voice is an acquired taste at best, but the disc is so dense, and hits so many different styles, from spare minimalism to thick, high-volume walls of noise, that there's bound to be something for any fan of underground hip-hop. Listeners should be forewarned, however, that this will take some getting used to. To the uninitiated, this will sound like an incoherent mess, without a center or constant theme running throughout the album. There isn't even any unity, lyrical or musical, within the individual tracks themselves -- within the same verse,
Circus is just as likely to relate a trenchant political insight as he is to spit out a dadaist stream of nonsense words strung together.
Know Future is as challenging and offbeat as underground hip-hop gets, but fans who stick with it will be rewarded with some of the most fascinating music around.