B. Dolan - Fallen House, Sunken City

The last time we heard from B. Dolan, he was writing to us from a bomb shelter as the world ripped apart at the seams on his epic tale of dystopia, ‘The Failure’. On his newest album, ‘Fallen House, Sunken City’, he joins up with legendary indie-rap beatsmith Alias to survey the aftermath. B. Dolan has already established himself as a master storyteller, but this time he presents a full-throttle, grime-caked, and unashamedly boom-bap hip hop record. With Anticon veteran Alias behind the production board, B. Dolan's aggressive yet conscious  and erudite delivery is accentuated by a special brand of huge bass-heavy breakbeats while the tailor-made musical backdrops contribute to the mood of impending doom. It took two years of relentless work to form the kind of album that not only sneers at the factory-preset menu of hip hop cliches, but downright destroys them. The true value of this record, however, is not in finger-wagging nostalgia for a lost golden era. At its heart, ‘Fallen House, Sunken City’ is a powerful album of focused experimentation that would rather lead by example than romance the dead. ‘Economy Of Words’ finds Alias executing dubstep rhythms, ‘Body Of Work’ has B. Dolan exploring the mindset of a sex worker, and ‘Border Crossing’ has a beat provided by a marching band. The album also features guest appearances by indie-rap contemporaries P.O.S and Cadence Weapon. Unlikely as it seems, B. Dolan and Alias have crafted a sound rooted with authority in the best traditions of hip hop, with enough irreverence, energy, and vision to deface its tombstone and reanimate the corpse. This is post-rap, psychedelic-hop horrorcore politics. Expect heavy online and specialist press coverage in the build up to release and beyond, seeded initially by strategic leaks of promo-only remixes by El-P, Buck 65, and Evil N9ne. Full UK tour in March & April with Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip.

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