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I'll Sleep When You're Dead
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I'll Sleep When You're Dead [Explicit]
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MP3 Music, March 20, 2007
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Vinyl, Explicit Lyrics, October 14, 2022
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Track Listings
1 | Tasmanian Pain Coaster featuring The Mars Volta |
2 | Smithereens (Stop Cryin) |
3 | Up All Night |
4 | EMG |
5 | Drive |
6 | Dear Sirs |
7 | Run the Numbers featuring Aesop Rock |
8 | Habeas Corpses (Draconian Love) featuring Cage |
9 | The Overly Dramatic Truth |
10 | Flyentology featuring Trent Reznor |
11 | No Kings |
12 | League of Extraordinary Nobodies |
13 | Poisenville Kids No Wins/Reprise (This Must Be Our Time) featuring Cat Power |
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
When a hip-hop album opens with a collaboration with modern-day prog-rockers the Mars Volta, you know to expect the unexpected. That's pretty much what Brooklyn's El-P (born Jaime Meline) has been delivering since day one, first as a member of now-defunct indie-rap heroes Company Flow and later as founder of the maverick New York label Definitive Jux. Trent Reznor and Cat Power also show up on his first new release in five years, but El-P remains the one to watch, rattling off his typically complex rhymes about the state of the world (and the bedroom) over the cling-clang of industrial beats and frenzied noise. It's dense and weird and sometimes even scary, all of which makes it a marked improvement over the usual Saturday night boom-bap. --Aidin Vaziri
Product details
- Is Discontinued By Manufacturer : No
- Language : English
- Product Dimensions : 5.5 x 0.5 x 5 inches; 8 ounces
- Manufacturer : Definitive Jux
- Date First Available : February 12, 2007
- Label : Definitive Jux
- ASIN : B000MM0KXS
- Number of discs : 1
- Best Sellers Rank: #82,545 in CDs & Vinyl (See Top 100 in CDs & Vinyl)
- #1,246 in Pop Rap (CDs & Vinyl)
- #34,831 in Pop (CDs & Vinyl)
- Customer Reviews:
Customer reviews
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- Reviewed in the United States on September 29, 2007I was expecting the best and thorough execution since El-p's last album was years ago. I must confess this is his finest work next to production with any member of the Def Jux camp. I especially liked his ability to work with some of music's finest artist collaborating on the best music he has graced our ears with. I listen to his cd as a muse to my own personal renaissance and can only hope El-pP keeps churning out musical masterpieces like this in the near future
- Reviewed in the United States on October 11, 2016Very unique blend of Hip Hop and Rock instrumentals. EL-P's production is top shelf as always. Great place to start if you want more Run The Jewels type music
- Reviewed in the United States on April 20, 2008If you're looking for radio glitzy, run of the mill, pop-hop, then this is NOT a selection you want to make! El-P's beats are innovative, yet tried and true, through years of practice on similar themed albums. Lyrically, he may not be the greatest MC, but his effort and his context and subject matter, more than make up for his straight to the point, conversational style.
- Reviewed in the United States on January 29, 2013I've listened to these songs online for a long time and decided I wanted something tangible. Amazon allowed me to download the songs right after I bought the CD so that was cool, unnecessary but I get it. The album is great.
- Reviewed in the United States on February 21, 2017EL-P
- Reviewed in the United States on August 31, 2014You are Dead. I can sleep now.
- Reviewed in the United States on March 21, 2007I keep reading that El-P has eased up on the carpet bombing production techniques and started using melody. That he has slowed down his flow and let his tracks breathe a little more on his new album. Now that I finally got my grubby little hands on El's new album I'll Sleep When Your Dead, I've found that there is more melody, he has slowed down his flow, and his tracks do breathe a little more (I stress a little more).
So all these things should make for a more accessible listening experience right? Well it's not. ISWYD is arguably less accessible than his 2002 debut Fantastic Damage. When you listen to Fantastic Damage for the first time, it's possible to be completely overwhelmed by the virtuoso complexity of the whole thing. The beats are abrasive and noisy, and the lyrics are almost indecipherable without a written copy in front of you. But on Fantastic Damage, the beats, though abrasive and noisy, are very immediate. You can nod your head along with most of the songs. On ISWYD, the beats are generally more noisy and chaotic. It's hard to really pick something out that's at all catchy, at least on the first listen.
This is one of those albums that you have to let marinate. After a few listens you start to hear the hook on Run the Numbers, and you start to realize that the drum line on EMG is pretty great. On first listen, the opener Tasmanian Pain Coaster is a frustrating experience. There is really nothing approaching conventional hip hop on the close to 7 minute track. But then you bust out the lyric sheet and read along with the song. You realize what the songs about, and then you begin to hear all the layers of production. ISWYD is one of those onion albums, the more you listen to it the more layers you peel off.
Production wise, El-P continues to evolve. Though he has a recognizable style, he changes his approach slightly for the performer he is working with. He uses heavy, slow urban beats for Cannibal Ox, or fuzzy and hard beats for Mr. Lif. On this album, his production suits the dark tone of the album. The songs are mainly about social commentary and are a critique of the government and society, so the beats are heavy, sludgy and noisy, fitting the tone of the lyrics.
As an MC, El-P has always been technically great, but a little obtuse. On this album his delivery is a bit more measured, actually rapping with the beat instead of overpowering the beat. He has also improved as a storyteller. Just listen to him describe meeting a friend who he hasn't seen in a while on the opening track and noticing that he has blood on his laces.
So nothing has really changed for El-P. The sound is slightly different, but he's still concerned with paranoia and social critiques. His work is still complex and difficult, but with repeated listening it can be very rewarding. This is easily the best rap album of the year so far, and it's really not even close.
- Reviewed in the United States on June 6, 2007Hip-hop was becoming a tired institution when El-P, Bigg Jus and Mr. Len (under the moniker Company Flow) recorded one of the most stunning hip-hop albums of the '90s. Bleak, raw, and verbally devastating, 1997's Funcrusher Plus provided a real alternative to G-funk as the three fireball emcees rapped about war, corporate greed and extraterrestrial evil over bargain-basement beats and unsettling ambience. Over the next few years, El-P built up his Definitive Jux label and released a stream of high-quality recordings by some of the most vital emcees in the game, nearly all of whom used Funcrusher Plus as a blueprint to varying degrees. The label had gone quiet in 2007 when rumors of a new El-P record finally surfaced, sending excited twitters through the underground community. Some questioned the rapper's intent when they found out that the album would feature collaborations with Trent Reznor ("hmm"), The Mars Volta ("uh..."), and Chan Marshall of Cat Power ("are you serious?"), but most were fairly certain that it would pulverize in typical El-P fashion.
And pulverize it does. I'll Sleep When You're Dead feels absolutely ferocious; it's the roaring, heavy metal counterpart to Funcrusher Plus's skeletal hardcore punk, and it takes no prisoners from its galvanizing start to its death knell of an ending. Songs are packed to the gills with weird, ungodly noises, melodies appear and disappear like holographs, and dense yet nuanced rhymes roll atop percussion that could have been created by actual weaponry. Indeed, there's so much violence on this record that it should be traumatic to drink in, but El-P's skill and insight on the mic, his studio perfectionism and his flair for idiosyncratic drum programming keep the proceedings as gripping as a 13-car pileup.
Deeper listening reveals that Sleep thrives on a couple of paradoxes. First, the album maintains its focus and cohesion even as it spins off in many different directions. The doomy atmosphere of "Tasmanian Pain Coaster" doesn't sound much like the Brooklynese bounce of "EMG" or the almost operatic "Poisenville Kids No Wins," but even with the diversity (which is inevitable, what with the hundreds of sounds being employed), it's clear that there is a particular aural agenda at work. I'll Sleep When You're Dead sounds uncannily like a comic book, which isn't to knock it; after all, comic books these days attain a level of darkness and extremity that filmmakers are often too risk-averse to attempt. Imagine swarms of robotic flying insects in the Invader Zim cartoon from your worst nightmare raining down machine gun fire and you're getting close.
The second paradox has to do with El-P's lyrics, which attend to personal and universal problems as though they're both part of the same sick plan for humanity that was doomed from the very beginning. While Clipse's Malice and Pusha T believe that a worldly issue (coke dealing) affected their personal states (thickly obfuscated misery), El-P flips the algorithm: He views every act of savagery--from speeding cars to sexual abuse--as indicative of the world's endemic evil. Though it's clear that he doesn't want any part of it, he admits has no choice. He calls himself the "son of urban confusion hatched in a pit where brutes live" and "half a robotic monkey ugly born of a viral agent." Like Nas on his classic Illmatic, El-P simply speaks about what he sees and uses his observations as a form of social protest, reinforcing the idea that the most affecting hip-hop finds a middle ground between slouching back in the seat of a flashy convertible and trying to change the world. His raps have slowed down a bit from his previous work to become part of the rich milieu and to let us latch onto every grim metaphor he hurls our way, but don't worry; El-P's flow will still knock you out of your chair.
And the collaborations? They're all excellent, probably because El-P isn't concerned about flattering his guests, writing his songs his way and using Reznor, Marshall, Rodriguez-Lopez and Bixler-Zavala purely as filigree. The Mars Volta caps off the blitzkrieg "Tasmanian Pain Coaster" with an a funereal trudge, Marshall lends her emphatic torch singing to the chorus of "Poisenville Kids No Wins," and Reznor's sinister cackle seems form-fitted to the electronic torture chamber of "Flyentology." Though they do seem like unorthodox choices, especially compared to Def Jux labelmates Cage and Aesop Rock, all of these artists deal with depravity in their own music (albeit in different ways), and after a few listens, their additions on this album click oddly into place.
I'll Sleep When You're Dead is an utterly urgent recording, something that (unfortunately) feels appropriate for our perpetual state of emergency. Nas once famously spit, "I never sleep, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death," to which El-P eventually paid tribute: "The timepiece must've read early morning at least, so I laid death's cousin, woken by the silence of the peace." The title of this record, then, seems like less of a threat and more of a helpless prayer to a deaf higher power. Something tells me that, deep down, El-P wishes that there wasn't any need for him to enter the rap world and do what he does. But as long as we live on Earth, this record is as good a warning as any to sleep with one eye open.
Top reviews from other countries
- RobertReviewed in the United Kingdom on November 13, 2023
5.0 out of 5 stars ;)
Super album !!!!
- ArtyChefRichReviewed in the United Kingdom on September 9, 2016
5.0 out of 5 stars Relatable and Debateble
Outstanding.
I have to say it's rare to find, let alone connect with, honest lyrics, paired with exceptionally innovative music production.
(Regardless of the haters.. Sampling, at its best, is a true art form. Add in, El-P's Iraq War background (I am a fellow product of the same war) and you get this perfect storm of an album.
*DDFH*
- A. FriendReviewed in the United Kingdom on February 26, 2008
5.0 out of 5 stars The name is El-Producto my friend....
This album was well worth the long wait since Fantastic Damage dropped.
Unlike previous albums (and other Def Jux compilations), ISWYD really flows as one beautifully crafted journey from start to finish. The more I listen to this, the more I love it.
The beats are "dirty, dusty" as ever, and the lyrics still poignant, intelligent and potent. This is another proud feather in El-P's cap.
I spoke to him last October after a gig in Manchester and he told me he was already working on new material - so hopefully us Jukies won't have an extended wait for the next album!
- Hunter s tReviewed in the United Kingdom on February 28, 2016
5.0 out of 5 stars Top notch
Great album - El-P is a true artist and this album doesn't disappoint. Intelligent hip hop at its best.
- B ADCOCKReviewed in the United Kingdom on June 12, 2016
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Loved it. El-p best solo album for me. Essential purchase