****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
Ghostface Killah (of Wu Tang Clan fame) gets the starring role here, but this album is really the brainchild of musician and composer (and according to Wikipedia, entertainment law professor) Adrian Younge. Check out the interview with him on NPR's Fresh Air earlier this year, but the story goes like this..."Twelve Reasons to Die" is actually the soundtrack to a movie that doesn't (yet) exist. In it, Tony Starks (Ghostface Killah's stage alter-ego) is a black man working for the DeLuca's, an Italian mob family. Starks aspires to criminal greatness, but is held back because of his race and decides to take over the mafia clan. Unfortunately, he falls for a femme fatale who ends up betraying him by arrangement of the DeLucas and he's murdered, melted in acetone, and pressed into 12 different vinyl records which are doled out to each member of the DeLuca clan. But each time one of the records is played, Starks rises from the dead, resurrected as Ghostface Killah, and exacts bloody revenge down to the last man.So, the rap lyrics throughout the album -- written by Ghostface, with all of the mafia references and tales of gun-fueled betrayal and revenge -- are really telling the story of Younge's screenplay, which is kind of a tongue-in-cheek tribute to and parody of old Italian horror films. Musically, Younge integrates a wall of different sonic textures as backdrop, merging the iconic spaghetti Western film score sound of Ennio Morricone with all of its guitar riffs, bells, and whistles (literally -- think Fistful of Dollars) along with a haunting young opera soprano's voice and the warm, fat, electronic, vinyl sound of 1960's and 70's American soul music featuring thick bass lines, an R&B drum kit, and an organ, similar to what Younge explored on Adrian Younge Presents the Delfonics (with Delfonics lead singer William Hart's eerie vocals returning for a guest appearance here on track 6). On top of that, he adds the occasional jazz riff (Younge himself on keyboards and other instruments) and the Wu Tang Clan stylings of rappers Ghostface Killah, Masta Killa, and Inspecta Deck featured prominently as lead voices. The raps are clever, free-flowing, and all the while part parody given the backstory. That comic mafia-xploitation nod never allows the rapping itself to be taken too seriously, and that's not a slam -- on the contrary, it really adds to the enjoyment of the lyrics.Younge's conception here was to imagine how the RZA (who serves as executive producer) would have created the soundtrack to an Italian horror movie-blaxploitation tribute flick, the likes of which you might find Tarantino directing (heck, I wouldn't be surprised if Tarantino and/or the RZA *does* direct Younge's movie!) and that is a perfect description of what's here. Only, this is really Younge's trademark sound -- one that he started with the Black Dynamite (Original Motion Picture Score) and continued on the Delfonics album, and which really gels here with the integration of Ghostface and others from Wu Tang Clan. It's a little short in duration by today's album standards at less than 40 minutes, but this is really an old-school record that should be played as an integrated album -- all the way through, from start to finish (though certainly the title number -- probably the strongest track -- can and will function as a stand-alone single). Shout-out to Terry Gross for helping to widen the audience of this great piece of music.
