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Weaning your rhymes of gats, bitches and bling-bling swagger while
not selling many records may be enough to make you "underground," but
it's probably not enough to make hip-hop zinesters call you a
"criminally ignored poet-prophet." For that you likely have to be a
cagey vet like Aceyalone, the L.A.-based MC who dished out edified
rhymes back before G-Funk took hold and helped to forge a scene that
gave rise to "alt-rap" torchbearers like the Jurassic 5 and Dilated
Peoples. Accepted Eclectic, his third solo record, shuffles
between crusty rants and self-consciously weighty rhetoric —
even though he's only old enough to have been Mos Def's babysitter,
he'll preach like he's your papa every now and then. But as he's
reeled in the years, he's also reeled in plenty of new tricks,
refining a flow that makes for equal parts good metaphor and prankish
good fun. And though the beats tend to be sturdy rather than jiggy,
bouncy or otherwise car stereo-worthy, Aceyalone's defter than ever
with a hook (witness the kinky groove of "Golden Mic"), meaning this
one just might be accepted by folks other than zinesters and
scenesters.
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