Gil Scott-Heron, the Tennessee-raised “grandfather of rap,” has returned strong after a decade of cocaine-related legal troubles. The 28-minute, 15-track record filled with interludes, simple and grinding drumbeats, covers, and his signature rhythmic poetry is Heron's first studio album since 1994. Only three tracks surpass the three-minute mark, but however brief, I’m New Here is a long overdue generational link that reunites the modernization of the artists's influence with its maker.
The album opens with “On Coming from a Broken Home, Pt. 1,” a poetic narrative of his upbringing over a sample from Kanye West’s “Flashing Lights.” Kanye had sampled Heron's “Home Is Where The Hatred Is” in his 2005 song, “My Way Home,” featuring rapper Common. “I want to make this a special tribute, to a family that contradicts the concepts, heard the rules and wouldn’t accept,” begins Heron as he honors the life and death of his grandmother, Lilly Scott.
“Me And The Devil,” a standout Robert Johnson cover, strongly introduces the influence of the rapper's new producer Richard Russel of XL Recordings (M.I.A, White Stripes, Radiohead). Heavy, methodical, industrial-sounding drumbeats guide Heron’s weathered voice through the powerful single.
The title track and Smog cover, “I’m New Here,” takes listeners inside Heron’s hopeful 60-year-old mind as he shares old lessons while learning again in a new world. A promising guitar accompaniment from Pat Sullivan jangles behind the lyrics, “No matter how far wrong you’ve gone, you can always turn around, and you may come full circle, and be new here again.” It is the most refreshing track on the album, and a statement of rebirth and redemption.
The album takes a creepy turn at track four, “Your Soul And Mine,” when Heron covers his own 1970 song “The Vulture” over a soundscape of time moving, gear-grinding synthesizers. In his 19-second interlude, “Parents,” he heeds his listeners to “spend a few minutes with yourself,” to listen to ancestors’ spirits running through one’s blood stream.
Heron, accompanied by a piano and a string-based beat, wails the blues out of Bobby Bland’s “I’ll Take Care Of You.” He follows the track with a poetic state of drunken-confusion called “Where Did The Night Go,” which is sandwiched by two interludes.
“New York Is Killing Me” is the closest thing to older finger-snapping tracks such as “The Bottle.” Laced with upbeat handclaps and very limited use of the drums, guitar, southern sounding female background vocals, and synthesizers, the rapper shows his age and experience gained over the years.
Although Heron does not adopt the modern hip-hop principle of boasting and bragging, he makes it clear on track 12 that he is still running things. The appropriately titled “Running” is arguably the most insightful and original piece of poetry on the album. In two minutes, the album pushes and pulls the listeners’ minds around the word “running” until they have circled right into the prequel to the rebirth of Heron’s career.
Preceded by a character-defining interlude, another poetry reading called The Crutch leads into the album’s closing title, “On Coming from a Broken Home, Pt. 2,” another West-sampled lullaby of Heron appreciating the women in his life that have made him a man.
With less political insistence or “Shaft-like” songs to groove to than previous albums, I’m New Here should make an interesting set performance for Coachella attendees on April 18. The choice of sounds used in his dark industrial beats are very reminiscent of those used by Thom York or The Prodigy, artists also on XL Recordings, but he maintains his reputable identity.
Heron sounds wiser, slower, but calculated. In combination with his classic-southern-revolutionary style, the album and its format is something we have yet to hear this century. It is genre breaking, and is feeding tidbits to let the world know that he is back in the spotlight, with perspective to share.
Standout Tracks: “Me And The Devil,” “I’ll Take Care of You,” “New York Is Killing Me,” “Running”
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