Hail Mary Mallon, is the latest side project from Aesop Rock what the name is all about is beyond me…but why question it. With his project's strange name and an even stranger album, Are You Gonna Eat That, Aesop's crew crank out the indie hop with the usual flair and quality you'd expect from him. Dark, broody, and as gritty as the cover would suggest, Are You Gonna Eat That is a post-great recession album for our age.
With songs about depression, violence, and frustration Are You Gonna Eat That is anything but the feel good album of 2011. Grimy beats and aggressive rhymes push the record into dark territory while odd synth stabs give the record a bit of eerie atmospherics. This is a good record that unashamedly takes things in a disturbing direction and loves doing so. That being said, it's not all gloom and doom, there are moments of respite. "Breakdance Beach," for example, is a crazy tune that could level a dance floor and is so rooted in 1985 you can almost imagine Run DMC leaping out of their Addidas.
Be it Hail Mary Mallon or his own work, Aesop Rock is one dude that could build hip hop gold out of a broken record and a mixer with a short. Are You Gonna Eat That is a strange off center hip hop record that's brilliantly gloomy and proves once again that Aesop is one of the best hip hop artists on the planet.
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