Inside the boundaries of hip hop and rap when someone mentions a ‘teacher’ people immediately think of Krs-One. And though in many respects this is true, a real secondary school teacher hit the underground world in 2002. J-Live is the person I am referring to who made one of if not the best album of 2002. What immediately strikes me about J-Live is he seems to be a man that can do anything he wants. I mean, becoming a teacher and at the same time as educating people you release an extraordinary hip hop album is not a ‘usual’ thing to do. When you put education, passion and hip hop together you get some of the best results. Considering the things that he conquers on this album, J-Live certainly comes across as a man with many things going for him. This relaxed, jazzy and melodic inspiring album is technically perfect. The way J-Live flips words and has deep double meanings is so clever that it is beyond enjoyable to listen to. He doesn’t bother wasting album time with irrelevant skits and offensive, stupid lyricism. He crams packed 77 minutes of The Roots (with better lyricism) reminiscent songs. Not only a lyricist, J-Live composes many of the songs himself using soft guitar plucks, lights voice instrumentals and light base lines. Though his latest EP ”Always Will Be” is very good in many ways, I feel that this album is what made him the household name among the underground that he is now. ”All Of The Above” is one of the most creative and refreshing albums I have heard in a long time, proving J-Live in a teacher beyond the classroom.

Tracklisting & Rating
1) First Things First Not Rated
2) How Real Is It 5 Stars
3) Satisfied 5 Stars
4) Interlude 1 (I’m a rapper) Not Rated
5) MCee 5 Stars
6) Like This Anna 5 Stars
7) One For The Griot 5 Stars
8) Stir Of Echoes 4 Stars
9) Interlude 2 (For the babies) Not Rated
10) Do That S#!% 4.5 Stars
11) All In Together Now 5 Stars
12) Nights Like This 5 Stars
13) The 4th 3rd 5 Stars
14) Travelling Music 4 Stars
15) A Charmed Life 5 Stars
16) All Of The Above 4.5 Stars
17) Interlude 3 (Whatever) Not Rated
18) Happy Belated 5 Stars

The best song on the album comes up almost immediately sparking the album off to its first five star status. ”Satisfied” produced by DJ Spinna has an undercurrent of John Coltrane’s ”A Love Supreme” to it, with a jazzy, tip-of-the-tongue sort of feel to it. Light instrumentals make up the main part of the production as a wind flute; electric keys, guitar keys and an accordion take flight. I personally found myself attaching onto the eerie sounding choral voices that come across all these instruments with the simple question ’Are you satisfied’. J-Live and DJ Spinna purposefully provoke questions to the listener questioning them, that though they have a nice job are they really satisfied with the world around them. J-Live almost pokes fun at himself, talking to himself in places saying that he likes his job and his financial situation is not bad, but really how satisfied is he? Though he’s calm you can tell that this is a subject matter is something that he feels passionate about. This shines through as he addresses rappers that may be good for ’punch lines and puns’ but addresses where this will take hip hop. His extended metaphors of taking the world and comparing it to flowers that need to be refreshed are ingenious! Politically strong and unique, J-Live shows that he stand in a league of his own as he hits a classic strike on only the third song on the album! ’Now it’s all about NYPD caps and bumper stickers, but yo, your still a ni--a’.

”Mcee” is another song that many are attracted to for its irresistible wordplay and sugar sweet charisma and is the second best song on the album. J-Live shows his double talent as he comes to produce the tracks incorporating a very old school scheme of a wobbling electric keys, a light guitar pluck and a slamming drum loop. Choral scratching and electronic voices spell out the songs title as J-Live rips into the track with a delivery and voice that sounds remarkably like Mos Def. In the first verse, J-Live introduces himself and where hip hop is from talking directly to the listener saying how he never realized that he would get to where he is now. ’It’s ill because my role models is my peers now, and my thoughts will be in your ears for years now’. His relaxed word play is truly remarkable and this song would be good enough but then the second verse comes around and blows everything else away. Much like Phi-Life Cypher did on their incredible track ”A.B.C” instead of using the alphabet, J-Live uses just the letter M and C to construct his second verse. He defines what an emcee is using words with those letters and produces one of the greatest verses of all time! ’More Concentration on My Cadence Might Cloud your mind. Controlling your Movement Capaciously, my Capacity to Massacre Crumbs. And Motive Change Most Certainly Makes you Consider me’. This is creative and charismatic lyricism at it’s best. Incorporating the Eric B type production is just the icing on the cake and makes one of the most enjoyable songs on the album.

Joe Money provides the best production on the album on ”Like This Anna”. Made out of weird background howling keys, a light beating drum loop and a sweet light electric backboard, the song is a mix of contemporary hip hop, soul and funky jazz. The song oddly reminds me of A Tribe Called Quest because of it’s jazz influence and the timing. J-Live takes his time with each verse talking about a women called Anna that isn’t a ‘h-e’ but doesn’t know whether to trust men because she’s been hurt many times before. Once again the song isn’t as straight forward as that as J-Live takes the song title and uses it in another way to play on the name ‘Anna’ to mean ‘and a’ also! But doing this you can relate the song to all women in the situation and not limit the track by names. If you like artists such as Common and Talib Kweli, this song (and album) is nothing short than perfect for you. With a John Coltrane jazz/blues vibe underlying J-Lives amazing lyricism this is my third favourite song on the album. ”Do That S#!%” is another reality check mixed with braggadocio for many people as J-Live brings the truth about many things. Over DJ Spinna’s beat of saxophones, bizarre jungle noises (don’t ask) and a pressing hi-hat, J-Live talks of children thinking they’re ‘tough’ but actually not knowing what touch is. His lyrics are in depth and honest, bringing life and reality to the forefront of his raps. Though he mixes a little bit of superb bragging in with this song, mainly this is a track about what the new generation does with their lives. ’Yo I'm just shooting the breeze with carbon dioxide. That needs to be bottled and sold, so you can lo' and behold, or would you hold it below. C'mon let go and be high, you can't deny the words I'm flipping make you reach for the sky’.

”Nights Like This” is the most beautiful song on the album, not the most lyrical or focused but the most beautiful. Joe Money comes in again with backing vocals from a woman called Rocafella, deep piano keys and a sharp triangle. This song is one of the jazziest on the album with a touch of soul. Here J-Live almost talks a lyrical, emotional love song. Here he speaks of a night when he can see the stars and reminisces on love and goes strangely political that I’m sure will be overlooked by many; ’Follow me into the lead, together we can set the speed. Breed like seeds, do you know how many had to bleed just so you could read?’. This is a reference to how the slaves fought and died just so black people could read and educate themselves. This is a bizarre message to be mixed in with a love song but it works so well. This is another social conscious track by J-Live that is ridiculously relaxing to listen to. ”A Charmed Life” sees a autobiography of J-Lives life come into play. P Smoova brings an actual extract from ”A Kind Of Blue”. This is the jazziest song on the album taking the structure from the great ones such as Miles Davis and Charlie Parker. Here chello’s, light piano keys and a deep base kick in as J-Live describes his life. He takes the listener through his home life where his mother thought education was the most important thing. J-Live then goes on to talk about how the streets tempted him but he stayed focused. Though this is an autobiography it’s also a message to the listeners to keep your education as it will get you places. This sort of extreme teaching (NOT preaching!) makes this one of the most enjoyable songs on the album.

J-Lives run of creativity comes to an end with ”Happy Belated”. Much like Nas’ ”It Aint Hard To Tell” this song is like a quick freestyle dropped over sparse piano keys, a deep hi-hat and a tapping symbol. J-Live unleashes fresh faced, creative braggadocio. While staying calm and collected you can tell that J-Live means business. His lyricism isn’t impeccable but his uniqueness and style is! The production is the simplest on the album, which highlights J-Lives lyricism even more and making his words more potent. This song sums up that J-Live is one of the most talented emcees that the underground has been offered in years.

’Peep the uniqueness’ because J-Live is one of the most extraordinary emcees I have come across in a while. His delivery and whole mentality is reassuring, and the subject matter of each of his songs is stellar. Though this album (and sue me for saying it) can get a little dull with the production lagging towards the end, lyrically J-Live is as good as they come! Being a teacher certainly has effected his perceptions as a rapper, but that does nothing but fuel this album into righteousness. One good thing about J-Live is you never get the feeling that you are being preached to. With some emcees, and by no fault of their own, they sometimes come across as being very patronizing and ‘intellectual’. Yes J-Live is a clever man and artist but he never seems above his listener, which makes him about to relate to them more. As I touched on before J-Lives subject matter is stellar. With wide varieties of topics covered from politics, to romance to the state of hip hop as it is, the lyricism on here will keep you guessing. Adding to that, J-Live shows humor and retrospect, telling the listener many times that they can’t really be listening to this as underground hip hop doesn’t sell. His clever play on words and his whole-relaxed mentality mixed with jazz samples and light keys is wonderful. There simply is no need to go to school again, just sit down and be educated by a man who knows it all including the curriculum!

Overall Rating
5 Stars


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Recommended: Yes