Undun

Over the course of two decades and 14 albums (more or less), The Roots have simultaneously become the most hip-hop group in hip-hop, and the least hip-hop group in hip-hop. While the legendary Philly crew began as the embodiment of hip-hop in its purest form - no image, no swag, just an intense focus on making better music than everyone else - they've slowly but surely expanded far beyond their original "dope rhymes x dope instrumentation" foundation. That means that some hardcore purists will listen to the group's new album undun and long for the days of the group's classic head-nodding music. Instead of Mellow My Man's organic funk or Adrenaline's house party sparking, on undun we get a four track, purely instrumental series of Movements based on a Sujan Stevens piano soundscape. (Who? Exactly.) It's not exactly music you can step into a b-boy circle with; that's that least hip-hop part. But on its largest level hip-hop has always been about taking whatever you have around you - cardboard boxes, empty walls, Sufjan Stevens records - and transforming it into something new and entirely your own. And on that level undun is the most hip-hop album of the year. It's hard to reconcile the supremely high energy Roots that fans watch live every year with the increasingly slow, thoughtful and minimalist Roots we've heard on their last few albums, and undun is the most slow and minimalist one yet, but perhaps their lives shows are exactly the reason. The Roots hit a mind boggling 200 stages a year, so maybe their albums are where they go to breathe. Their live shows tear down buildings, their albums construct narratives that follow the life and death of characters like Redford Stephens, and by extension the black urban struggle. Undun clocks in at well under an hour, Questlove said he wants it to be "ADD proof", a running time that also magnifies the importance of the third of the album that's purely instrumental. It's on these vocal-free tracks that The Roots truly s