Penalty of Leadership

Nicholas Craven and Boldy James

explicit

Released on 1/12/24 by Nicholas Craven Productions
Main artists: Nicholas Craven Boldy James
Genre: Hip-Hop/Rap

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Detroit's Boldy James has one of the most enigmatic voices in his corner of neo-boom-bap street rap. It's a flat, often dazed-sounding monotone that wraps its flow so fluidly around his meticulously constructed imagery that it feels like he's less a blank slate than a still-waters-run-deep type given to introspection and stifled yet heavy feelings. Maybe that's why he's never short on inspiration; his dozen albums-plus discography in the first five years of the 2020s is already bigger and broader than some peers' 15-year runs. And James' tendency to foreground his work as a series of team-ups with distinct-sensibility producers is proof that he knows his voice can sound consistently gripping no matter the style of beats he's working with. Montreal producer Nicholas Craven rejoins him for Penalty of Leadership on the heels of 2022's fan-favorite Fair Exchange No Robbery, and the melancholy smooth-soul glide he provides is a good fit for James when it comes to highlighting the resonance in his flow and completing the emotional pull that his delivery only partially conceals.

"Formal Invite" uses a velvety R&B hook ("Shots ring out/ People shout") and electric piano glimmer to play up James' uncomfortable, bleak-humored juxtaposition of death and luxury, while the droning synth slow jam haze of "Evil Genius" pulls away the facade to let Boldy confess that the drug-trade-to-rap-game career arc would've made him a lot happier if he'd been able to skip that first step ("I just wish the bro was with me, look at all the time we wasted/ In the kitchen, whippin' 'caine/ Could've been took the game and dominated"). This is a rapper who tempers the street rap tradition of second-act Scarface opulence with third-act Irishman fatalism, where the morbid punchlines in "Murderous Tendencies" ("Real outspoken, my chopper chew with his mouth open/ Died with his tongue hangin' out his mouth (Jordan)") are defense mechanisms against the guilt and horror of being haunted by your dead friends, and the idea in "Speedy Recovery" that "most of these young'uns in the street just because of me" is an unnerving thought because it just means more bodies are going to pile up.

It's not all stress rap and over-the-shoulder glances; the Alchemist-esque guitar-prog noodling and supreme vet-rapper confidence of "All My Tokens" makes for a great album-closing victory lap, and his sole verse in "Early Worms Get Birds" is packed with hilariously audacious references ("Broke it down in all big, half a brick of Brock Lesnar/ Sanford & Son, sellin' junkyard dog to my Aunt Esthеr"). But the haunted conscience beneath that armor is what makes Penalty of Leadership such a compelling listen. © Nate Patrin/Qobuz

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Penalty of Leadership

Nicholas Craven

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Formal Invite Explicit