★★★★★
Billy Woods teams back up with Kenny Segal for Maps, another wonderful record by the New York MC, who manages to push the envelope each time he stops down this road less travelled – and on Maps, Woods and Segal are travelling.
There were few places to hide on Billy Woods and Kenny Segal’s 2019 record, Hiding Places. Though a cloak-and-dagger quality is central to Woods as an artist, he is as unflinching as he is poetic when putting pen to page. This was made more unnerving still when coupled – then for the first time – with the teetering, ominous production from Segal, a staple of Los Angeles’ alternative hip-hop scene. Underground rap is perhaps less underground than it used to be, but on Hiding Places Woods and Segal created a brilliant, uncomfortable record in the style of those that came before it.
Since then, Billy Woods has gone from strength to strength. Armand Hammer, the duo comprising Woods and Elucid – who features twice on Maps – achieved widespread acclaim for 2021’s Haram, and Woods returned with two brilliant solo albums in 2022, Aethiopes and Church. The prolific output becomes yet more admirable when you consider the topics and time going into each of Woods’ projects. They’re not throwaways.
Neither, unsurprisingly, is Maps. It’s hard to compare, but it might just be the best album of the lot, as Woods keeps up this remarkable run. Maps is very different to Hiding Places, it trades the anxiety of the unknown for the unease of life on the road. The stories are packed, as ever, with references to substance, relationships, race, literature and ancestry, the rhymes often making you sit forward, lyrics so good you want to read them as you listen.
They are complemented by Segal, who facilitates the stylistic shift perfectly as well. The production ebbs and flows, the touch gentle in places and inauspiciously building to an undesirable conclusion in others. Also crucial to this album’s brilliance is the energy and tone of the features on Maps.
‘Soft Landing’ really kicks the album into gear, Segal’s wonderful looping beat ensuring the entrance is indeed soft. Rhyming Attenborough, Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow and the brilliant beat-generation novelist William Burroughs at the beginning of the second verse is a personal favourite of mine from the whole album.
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Quelle Chris makes an appearance on the next track, ‘Soundcheck’. Here the narrative of travelling on tour takes better clearer shape, paving the road for the coming 40-odd minutes. The Quelle Chris verse at the end actually brings a much needed acidity to the song – his inflected, higher-pitched tone cuts through the tingling bells and monotone flow of Woods.
The production is most impressive on ‘Year Zero’ with Danny Brown. It is like being torn between two different destinations, neither of which sound particularly appealing. Brown, for his part, delivers an outstanding final verse. Like Quelle Chris, the inflections of more expressive rappers compliment Woods’ understated delivery.
The back to back tracks of ‘Baby Steps’ and ‘The Layover’ reinvigorate the travelling narrative, as well as introducing Elucid to the album. It’s another stand-out section of the album, the darkness coming before ‘Facetime’, which is definitely the sunniest place on Maps.
Aesop Rock brings the energy to ‘Waiting Around’, the wordplay as impeccable as ever as the tour takes Woods all the way to Belgium, finding hm In Bruges and then Amsterdam. Back Stateside on NYC Tapwater, Woods deals with getting home. “Survivor’s guilt with a side of buyer’s remorse” is another of my favourite lines from the album, but realistically you could compile a list from most verses, let alone songs.
