Soul Khan – Soulstice III

This is one of those joints where the music starts with no drum beat and the MC is off and running right away, no intro, no chorus, just spittin’ bars immediately. It builds in intensity and you are waiting for when the beat drops. You figure they are really gonna drop heavy. Sometimes when the drums come in, it is a disappointment. You are waiting for it to drop after 4 bars, but it doesn’t, so you wait and expect it after 8. The song is really heating up and you are like “Wow, that is a long time with no beat, wonder when it is gonna come in?”

Well, guess what?? … On Soul Khan’s “Soulstice III” – it never does! To give props where props are due, the music is awesome and Soul Khan’s flow is nuts on this – but I keep wanting to hear a beat!

About halfway through the song I realize this is one of those “look at me, I am being really creative” moments, where the MC (or producer) did something rare and held the song together with music and flow – no drums. Ghostface has done this successfully and one or two other artists I can’t think of right now (hey, remind me, in the comments).

Like I said, Soul Khan puts in work, flowing supercharged (and fast), telling the story over the infectious music and soulful singing. The rhyme scheme is intricate and delivery heavily syncopated. On top of that, I believe that is him singing the chorus himself. People will yell “Drake“, but I am thinking more like “Mos Def“. If you have only heard him in acapela rap battles, you will see (hear?) that the Brown Bag All Star definitely has flow and is not just a battle MC. But his style is different on this one. He admits in the second verse “This ain’t even how I rap, I’m just playing with it”.

The music is an instrumental borrowed from Rachel Grimes’ “My Dear Companion”. I have to admit, Soul Khan pulls it off. The song is dope. You know when you call your friend and they pick up and say “Yo, what’s good?” so you start telling them what you called about and a few seconds later you here “… I’m not here right now, but leave your name and number …”. You feel like, “Dammit, he got me!” That’s how I felt when I realized there was no beat and the song was gonna keep going – with no beat – and regardless, I was still going to like it!

Listen to the song and let me know if you like it too. Stare at the stunning naked chick in the artwork if it helps (hey, can’t hurt). I’m sure that’s what its there for.

– GMS

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Info: SoulKhan.com

About The Author

GMS

GMS is an MC, Producer, DJ, Musician and Teacher who blogs about Hip Hop at MCMIreport.com and about Technology, Cubing and other things at Cybersky.org. He is part of the rap group HYDRA and co-founder of MCMI and the crew known as The Plague.

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