Posted on 10/12/2009
I had always dismissed Anti-Pop Consortium as one of those groups who use innovation as a shield. Reunited after a slew of side projects, their music remains as defiantly abrasive, abnormal, aggressive, and atypical as perhaps anyone with a record deal inside the sphere of black music. That might look good on the old monitor, but you know what? Pablo Picasso could actually draw. With Anti-Pop Consortium, however, as their name itself implies, their constant nonconformity tends to be the only draw. Their unwavering indifference toward the beaten path, though commendable, has always struck me as being their only option; I simply do not believe that their brand of innovative hip hop is backed up by an ability to perform, you know, regular hip hop. I’m all for the off-kilter deliveries and genre blurring collages of futuristic chaos, but that all rings hollow without a hint at the chops needed to play straight ahead. This puts Anti-Pop Consortium in a tough place. On one hand they do succeed as torch bearers, providing a fresh bridge to the past while exploring the future at hyper-speed. Though inevitably, they are much better pioneers than rappers. Hip hop does need to be challenged, but only when its apex practitioners expand does the game truly elevate. Otherwise, the novel is destined for novelty. And yet Fluorescent Black is far too deep to be dismissed so one dimensionally.

The pieces of this album, each soaked gloriously in futuristic paranoia, are extremely disjointed. Yet fittingly enough, there is order out of chaos. Once the pieces sink in, a singular scope emerges from the entropy: Fluorescent Black forewarns the inevitable battle between power, and those who will resist it with pure, visceral righteousness. This is 1984 with drums. This is Dorothy rocking ruby Wallabees. This is Philip K. Dick break dancing in The Matrix. This is all of that at once, and yet one cohesive vision. I still have some qualms with their music, but Anti-Pop Consortium’s sheer efficiency in expressing themselves has got me thinking: what if this whole thing, the quest to innovate hip hop, was just a clever ploy by some surviving poets to expose themselves to fans of mere emcees?

- M. Steve Hammer