On Undun, the eleventh and first stringent concept album by The legendary Roots, the band uses the unconventional stylistic devices of a Quentin Tarantino and tells us the story of an imaginary Redford Stephens, starting at its end. Another source of inspiration must clearly have been The Wire. Hence, the protagonist unintentionally finds himself in the swamps of criminal doings, for which he’ll eventually (i.e. in the beginning of the record) have to pay with his life. After last year’s rather gospely How I Got Over, The Roots have yet again created a dark piece, critical of society, demonstrating today’s hopelessness in American city-ghettos and illustrating how their inhabitants become more and more disenchanted. Through Questlove’s inimitable drumming, Larry Gold’s string-genius and the many great piano-passages, Undun can’t be complimented enough, musically. By gathering the usual suspects, Dice Raw, Greg Porn and brothers in spirit like Phonte and Big K.R.I.T., they assembled adequate personnel for a Roots-release that’s far above the ordinary. It’s the ray of hope which always glimmers through the songs, as well as the hit-potential and catchiness of some of the tunes, which made the best Hip-Hop live-band crawl all the way up to an impressive 16th place in the US-charts. Still, it will remain a mystery how this project could be done asides their daily jobs as the Jimmy Fallon Show’s backing band. The one and only point of criticism is the record’s shortness of only 38 minutes – but even that can be forgiven, when the album’s dramatic four-parts-ending (chronologically the beginning of the story) is inspired by one of Sufjan Stevens’ (!) instrumental-suites.
Undun
