The following article was submitted by David Perry:

Buy the new album here!

If The Roots aren’t the best hip-hop artists of the past 15 years, then they’re definitely the most consistent. In those fifteen years, Tupac and Notorious B.I.G. died, and the rest of the rappers in the game have made a mockery of themselves, making mediocre albums to cash in on their past successes (see Nas, Jay-Z, etc.) In the age of Auto-Tune, The Roots have held on to the spirit of ‘90s rap/hip-hop while keeping it fresh and avoiding making the same album ten times over.

After plenty of critical and commercial success over the past 10 years, The Roots follow up 2008’s Rising Down with an album with a lot of sonic and thematic similarities. You can expect the same things that have made The Roots a good listen since the beginning: ?uestlove’s powerfully funky drumming and Black Thought’s gritty, fluid flow. The two keystones in The Roots’ sound are as sharp as ever on their newest album, How I Got Over.

However, the real brilliance of this album lies in the supporting cast, featuring two acts that drive the indie kids wild: supergroup Monsters of Folk and Joanna Newsome. It’s a trend I generally like in hip-hop, with Kid Cudi featuring MGMT and Ratatat on his first album. Now, I can’t stand Joanna Newsome as a rule, but when combined with ?uestlove’s driving drums and S.T.S.’s outstanding cameo rap, her voice goes from nails-to-the-chalkboard to absolutely hypnotic, making the track at least as good as the rest of the album.

Dear God 2.0, which borrows from Dear God by Monsters of Folk, is a truly magnificent track, where Black Thought fleshes out the ideas presented in chorus by MoF, pondering the existence of a divine being in a world filled with troubles. It sounds like a tired premise, but I promise the song is truly revelationary. The rest of the supporting cast, including John Legend and regular contributors Truck North and Dice Raw, turned in fantastic performances to match the caliber of ?uestlove.

When looking to put this in perspective with the rest of The Roots’ musical outputs, you can envision this as a triumphant conclusion (or chapter) to a story that began with 2004’s Game Theory and continued by 2008’s Rising Down. All three are have a dark and lush sound, all three have heavy political undertones, and all three are fantastic albums. Out of the three, though, How I Got Over is the easiest to listen to and the most engaging musically. For this reason, I give How I Got Over a 9.3 out of 10.