Arrested Development’s “For the FKN Love” is released
Conscious Hip Hop Legends’ Presumably Last Album a Tour-de-force of Guest Bars over Boombap-stic Production
I don’t mean to brag, but I am going to take a second to do just that. As per Supernova Earth’s recent interview with MC Speech from Arrested Development and UK SuperProducer Configa, we at The New Haberdasher were the FIRST people in the world who were not directly associated with the making of Arrested Development’s newest record For the FKN Love to hear the record, a full week ahead of the record’s release on Bandcamp on December 3.
That’s not a humble brag at all. It was a true honor to know that we had a world exclusive on our hands. And such an amazing album too! I am blessed to be associated with such talented and generous people as these two artists, sitting at the top of hip hop as an art form, whatever commercial music journalists do or do not say about them.
Then I am informed on The Supernova Earth Show that this will be Arrested Development’s last record! Configa says this might be his last album too, but I took that with a grain of salt, because that is in itself so unbelievable… That would be like me saying that “Supernova Earth 31”, where my cohost and I interviewed Speech and Configa could be my last podcast, when things are finally coming together for the show, we’ve hit our stride and are operating at top performance.
If this is indeed Arrested Development’s last record, it caps a massive career spanning three decades, that contains some of the most interesting sounding and well made hip hop. As I wrote on Twitter, to say it’s “shockingly good music” is wrong: AD has made music at such an excellent level that it would be a shock if they didn’t make a dope record filled with bangers that doesn’t sound like ANYthing being overpromoted and played out by major labels.
The New Haberdasher has covered Arrested Development’s music in the past. The last record Don’t Fight Your Demons was a killer album that I described as needed for the traumatic and chaotic year of 2020. It was a ray of light that cut through the clutter, spoke to so much that was going on around us, and provided a rallying point for people who were running on fumes, exhausted by years of beating, both figuratively and literally, provocation, reaction, social decay and official neglect. ...Demons was about holding your head up and embracing the thing that is supposed to crush you: Only by understanding what is trying to tear you down can you possibly hope to find a way to overcome it and rise. The message was that it is the struggle itself that makes us strong.
2021, the year that followed the release of ...Demons was in many way much worse than 2020. Because of the results of the 2020 election, this year kicked off with a riot that critics liken to an attempted coup in Washington, but when Bozo the Crook was replaced and the institutional transfer of power occurred on schedule, so many who had been struggling decided that now is the time to take a break. So against the Government one day, so concerned for the direction of society one day, so awake and activated one day, it feels like on the next day, a huge swath of society deactivated en masse and decided that they had won the war. They decided that the government who has been kicking us in the face for generations (plural) was now suddenly working for the people, that getting rid of Trump was going to end the social forces his administration emboldened and fostered. Even the “left” who called themselves critical of Biden, primarily because they were concerned that he wouldn’t effectively challenge Trump, for the most part, demobilized. Liberals who were one day rallying in the streets for social justice began to claim on the next day that any criticism of the Biden administration’s shortcomings was now an explicit endorsement of Trump, and that sort of apostasy could not be tolerated.
2021 was a year where the opposition to the brutality and inequality in our society largely evaporated, and proceeded to turn on itself. As we watched our “comrades” who swore just a few months before that they would fight until we won or died instead decide to return to brunch (a place many of us knew they all longed for the whole time) the reaction surged forward and proceeded to undo anything that had been accomplished. A dude who expressed support for jackboot thugs on the police force and Donald Trump got away with killing two people in the streets of Kenosha Wisconsin when he was acquitted of all charges. The Alt-Right has shed all pretenses to legitimacy and have explicitly adopted both the uniform and the moniker of exclusionary white supremacy. Any progress on reparations for descendants of chattel slavery has been reversed. The last direct aid that food and home insecure Americans got from the Government is a distant memory. Because the critical masses we needed to carry on the fight for a better society have all decided that they would rather support Jim Crow Joe’s Administration, no matter what.
So now, at the beginning of December of this horrible year, when the Opposition to the steamrolling of basically anyone below the upper middle class has collapsed, and a general policy of serfdom for the working class and extermination of the poor via starvation, lack of anything resembling health care, homelessness and police brutality has been all but codified, what do we do? Where do we turn to look for that bright light, a point on the horizon to aim at, when our leaders have either all been neutralized or have decided that they no longer have a stomach for the journey? What do we do as a society to prevent social obliteration now that our oppressors are emboldened and our friends have all abandoned us to the fickle mercy of people who neither know nor care that we exist, and often would prefer that we didn’t?
These questions are mostly rhetorical of course. The outlook is grim, but I have always found that music still has the power to transport people to a different place. It serves as a time machine, activating memories of another time, dragging long forgotten names out of the deep recesses of the listener’s long term storage, and evoking thoughts of where a person was when they heard that song. It also acts in a way as a request line on the radio: one song suggests another, and you will then want to go listen to that song too. It can also serve as a refuge from the storms of life, allowing a person to recharge a little WITHOUT withdrawing — it can give a person the strength to carry on another day.
Without putting too much gilding on this lilly of a record, For the FKN Love fulfills a lot of these roles. I know what artists say about their records when asked. No artist who is promoting his record — with the possible exception of Al Jorgenson who claimed that he liked a song from his band Ministry not because it was any good but only because he recorded a verse while David Bowie was in the studio — is going to say “Well, to be honest, my music is terrible, and valueless. I really just played random notes, and said words the way I said them because they happened to rhyme and that’s about as deep as it gets…”
But then again, no artist — with the possible exceptions of Noel Gallagher who claimed that Oasis was bigger than both the Beatles and God, and Mel C who then claimed that The Spice Girls were bigger than Buddha and Oasis — will fall all over themselves to place their own work at the center of massive cultural movements. Most artists take a moderate approach with regard to the impact of their work, and leave the hyperbole to music writers.
… Like me. It was a shame for me to find out that due to issues with timing and lack of knowledge about the process of submitting music for consideration for gramophone awards, …Demons would not be nominated in the category of Best Rap Album at the 2021 Grammys. But without a doubt, I would argue that For the FKN Love is an album as worthy to win in that category, if not more, in 2022. If I had the ability to make it happen, this album would take not only best rap album, but also Album of the Year and lifetime achievement.
We’ll start with the technical aspects of this record. The record is available now on Bandcamp, following the link above, at a suggested price of about 15 dollars US for the digital album (cheaper, by the way than CDs at the record store, and certainly less expensive than new vinyl.) For this, you will get 1 hour and 8 minutes of straight oldschool boombap conscious hip hop featuring not only the provocative lyrics of Speech and 1 Love from AD, and the expert meticulous production of Configa on the tracks, but also a host of guest appearances from both veteran and up-and-coming MCs, including marquee names like Big Daddy Kane, Monie Love, Masta Ace and The Sugar Hill Gang along with several MC’s who Speech stated on Supernova Earth were dope but weren’t getting enough shine. (The song “I want U 2 Make It” seems directed at this group and sounds like a How-To manual for the rising class of MCs who will pick up the mantle of Speech and other MCs as they leave the stage.)
What we have then is a classic banger-filled LP that not only stands as the swan song for Arrested Development’s illustrious recording career, but also serves to propel consciousness into the next Generation. Speech and Arrested Development have left their footprints on the history of Hip Hop with this record, and as one door closes while AD focuses more on touring and celebration of the music, others open: Configa, regardless of what he says, has a long future ahead of him as a world class producer, and meanwhile, every single guest verse on this record is presented by some blazing artist that can literally write their own ticket going forward.
The production — provided primarily by Configa, but also includes Cris Acosta, a producer who was featured on several killer tracks on …Demons, as well as Dayton, Ohio based soul-boombap producer Clint Taylor, and Speech himself — is clean, heavily orchestrated, and bass thumping. Lots of old-school effects and samples are brought to bear on the record, and the sonic landscape of the album continues the direction of AD from …Demons. If For the FKN Love had dropped in 1996 instead of 25 years later, we’d call it triphop, because it has not only a earthquaking quality to its low end, but the instrumentation over the top of the bass and drum rhythm section is lithe and airy, and is sometimes reminiscent of ambient music.
That juxtiposition of the hard thumping beat and the orchestration that in some places calls back Philly Soul (in, for example, “Vibe”), soft organs and gently picked guitars in other places which pull in the feeling of a smoky jazz lounge, like on the song “Do It Up” allow the lyrics to sit comfortable on top of the backing track like embroidery.
There is also the return of the use of historical speeches about black power and liberation, which is reminiscent of the golden era of conscious hip hop of the late 80s and early 90s. I think when I started listening to hip hop, hearing fiery speeches on hip hop records was so common that I sort of imagined that was just a feature of intelligent hip hop. In many cases I had no idea who I was listening to talking to me on a Public Enemy record, but I imagined that there was a time when black radicals just got up on a stoop or a box on the corner and started haranguing the crowd about how blacks needed to stand up and stop taking the beatings that cops were daily distributing, and stop accepting the dominant social narratives of blacks being inferior to whites, and all these people would stand around listening to this message, maybe for the first time while applauding.
Only later did I learn that these speeches were from Malcolm X, or Louis Farrakhan or Huey P. Newton, or Fred Hampton, and there indeed were actual meetings of radicals where people could talk like this to an audience who came to hear them speak. I was grateful to these bands for putting these samples on their records, and I am also thankful to AD for returning to the tradition, in a small but noticeable level on this record.
Thematically, this record runs the gamut from self reflection to celebration. You hear Speech questioning getting older on the neo-soul track “UNI(TY)” where he mentions the fact that he is kind of proud of his dad habits but would like to lose his dad body — the song as a whole deals a lot with the way middle age men see themselves physically, and how a lot of the weird expectations society puts on us (yeah, I’m a middle aged man myself) often affects our mental state. But perhaps the biggest celebration on the other hand on the record is the song “Swing Um” which is a posse track featuring veteran MC Masta Ace that sounds like a party but also talks about keeping your head up as the world around us remains f — d up.
The record also takes on gratitude and positivity on a track like the appropriately titled “Thank You”, how fathers and men in general should interact with our daughters and the women in our life whenever society tries to tear them down (“Never Had Your Back”), and the BS that’s associated with modern rap that is polluted by clout chasing, materialism and soulless executives in “We Are Not in Kansas No More”.
Overall, I’d say that the overarching theme of this record can be said to be an imperative to find the joy of simple and clean living. Many of the songs deal with small town or rural America, far from the rat race in the cities. Having good and honest friends, avoiding fake friends and unnecessary drama in life, and finding joy, even in the most stressful settings are prevalent ideas in most of the songs. I wouldn’t say this record is escapist: I would say more that it involves finding a way to survive and thrive in a world that is constantly trying to beat you down. Self sufficiency and positivity is another theme, both mentally and physically.
Noticeably absent are themes of militancy. I am not sure that Arrested Development were ever as militant as a group like Public Enemy. Even though the group did several songs about revolution, I always got the sense that the revolution they were talking about was at least primarily internal: Change your own mind and heart and then the world would change around you. But on this record especially, there are virtually no calls to stand up and physically fight back. It is possible that AD is as exhausted as the rest of us, and need to refuel before getting back on the front lines. But it is more likely that the message here is consonant with the band’s historical position that peace is preferable to war and one should only fight if it is absolutely necessary.
But in the context of Speech’s determined retirement from recording new music, this almost sounds like an expression of a desire to finally be allowed to retire. For the rest of us, we have to take it more as permission to breathe and enjoy the sunshine for a minute. I might be highly critical of those who have demobilized, I have to acknowledge that even those who are still at it, still talking about the things that matter, still organizing, and still opposing the darkness that permeates our society need a chance to catch their breath and decompress. This record then serves a reminder that this is both possible and preferable to always being at 11 all day everyday.
There is beauty in the world if we take a second to look around us. And even in the most adverse conditions, even in the warzone that is the social landscape of our deeply fractured world, there is beauty to be found, and rest for the weary, so that we can be not only ready for the next wave that is inevitably coming to buffet us, but so that we don’t lose sight of the world we are struggling to create. If we forget that there is peace and joy, we lose the thread; we no longer remember what all this struggle is for. It becomes about revenge for wrongs and perceived slights real or imagined. That hardly provides a legitimate reason to carry on the fight for a better world.
No album is perfect. I am not going to hit AD for not doing something I think they should have done with this record. Instead the one negative comment I have for this record is I think it bogs down a bit in the center. Following the very hype track “Swing um” and the ode to gratitude and “celebration of life, death and the struggle of our ancestors”, that includes a stuttering syncopation reminiscent of early career Phantogram on “Thank you”, the four or five songs in the middle of the set list are probably more thematically and musically different than the rest of the energy and vibe of the rest of the record.
For the FNK Love finishes strong, starting at “Grandma’s Southern Ways” and carrying through the lead off single “Vibe” and “Have Your Moment”. But those middle tracks, which are more introspective and feature production that stands quite separate from the rest of the record, felt like they required some effort to get through as I listen to the record once more for the tenth time. I think this could have been resolved by either moving maybe 8, 9, and 10 to the end of the record, or putting them up front, split by songs like “Swing Um”, “Building From the Bottom” and “UNI(TY)” to maintain the momentum through the end of the record that was built in the first half.
This record is long as albums go. I remember that 311’s Transistor, which I have said multiple times and places was my favorite record of all time by anyone ever, was almost exactly the same length as For the FKN Love. The music critics at the time panned this album for its length, among other things. They said it was overlong and indulgent. Maybe… but I think if the track order presents a coherent story, 67 minutes feels like 35 minutes. This is where the “bogged down in the middle” issue hurts this record. Where they sit on this album, those kind of slower, maybe more introspective, a little darker mood songs become a pile of mashed potatoes that the listener has to wade through.
The momentum slows coming into them, and by the time you get to the end of the much more electronic oriented “Where Lions Roar” you might have already lost all the energy that “Swing Um” had built. If the record is about taking a breath, this little stretch of songs in the center of the record kind of defeats that purpose. After that it takes two full songs to get back to the tempo and vibe to the first part of the record, and I remember just thinking that I was grateful to finally hit Vibe as sort of like the crescendo of the album.
The pacing in the middle is not disqualifying though. It is still a fact that this record is a master work of hip hop. Its production, by all producers on this record is never ever boring. If you take each song, there is a certain commonality or texture and aesthetic that unites the record. It is all thick bass boom bap. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if AD came out someday and said, retrospectively For the FKN Love was a theme album about positivity and creating joy out of bad circumstances. It is a coherent package that is worthy of the Veteran hip hop and the masterful producer that created it. Neither AD nor Configa left anything on the field for this record and it is a fitting album to announce AD’s retirement from recorded music.
Stand out tracks for me on this record are “Swing Um,” which was my favorite track on the record, both in terms of production because it was full of energy and featured amazing vocal cadence and delivery, but also lyrically and thematically: It sets a nice tone for the whole record, and really sounds like the MC’s on the track were really having a great time. Of course I dug the first single “Vibe” which featured Big Daddy Kane who never stopped being one of the greatest, most distinctive MCs of all time. I loved “Building from the Bottom”, which contains excellent verses from Speech and 1 Love about the history of AD, and their philosophy of making music. I dug the track “Be Refreshed”, which could be a sequel to the Dead Prez song “Be Healthy” that talks about similar issues of the importance of good nutrition, exercise and education. If you listen to these two songs together, “Be Healthy” first and then “Be Refreshed”, you can hear what I mean. And I liked “I Want U 2 Make It”: I like that xylophone on the backing tracking and I like the declaration of support for new and independent artists that Speech declares on this track.
All in all, we can say that For the FKN Love adds to the cannon of Arrested Development and really lives up to its name. This record is a great big thank you to the band’s fans: you really couldn’t ask for a better sounding, or more thematically appropriate album for the mood of society at the moment. AD thanks their fans, and of course, we thank them back for their thirty years of making dope hip hop and keeping conscious hip hop alive. Whatever AD and Configa have in their future, (hopefully a tour and a celebration with fans for Speech and AD, and MUCH more music from Configa forthcoming, but he is always welcome to join Supernova Earth as a full member too) I really appreciate the chance to listen to this record and review it.
And now: If you want to hear the record, here is For the FKN Love on Bandcamp. If you want your own copy, you can purchase it there: the money goes to the artist themselves, making Bandcamp the site that is most supportive of independent artists.
