De La Soul

Strong Island’s finest continue to soldier on in the hip-hop game without a label and it seems to be serving them just fine. This mix-tape release from De La Soul plays like a radio show as Pos and Dave take us through unreleased nuggets from their Tommy Boy days as well as penning their own verses for spoken-for Dilla and Kanye productions with the majority of the cuts ringing nicely in your ears. The unreleased joints from the De La Soul is Dead and Buhloone Mind State era sound rather rough quality wise and quite dated compared to the crisp new tracks, which is probably what De La intended as they make it quite clear they’re not too pleased with their ancient flows from the Prince Paul-era. With such short life expectancy for hip-hop groups you would never guess De La have been in the game for 20 years as Pos and Dave break longevity records for sounding fresher than ever on gorgeous Supa Dave West and Geology-produced tunes. Surprisingly, if you were to remove the old dusted songs from their glory years then Impossible Mission would have been an even tighter venture, but just hearing De La Soul bump at this stage of their career is enough to keep hip-hop fans convinced they shouldn't be falling off anytime soon.