Sound Ancestors

Madlib - Sound Ancestors
Critic Score
Based on 12 reviews
2021 Ratings: #311 / 753
Year End Rank: #34
User Score
2021 Rank: #543
Liked by 72 people
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CRITIC REVIEWS

100
The Guardian

Madlib channels a deep, intertwining lineage of Black music through Sound Ancestors like folklore oration, storytelling with the sorcery of a beatmaker who knows how to make an instrumental really sing.

80
Beats Per Minute

Sound Ancestors is a realisation of what the Madlib and Hebden are capable of in tandem. It’s bold, different, and takes the genre of instrumental hip hop to the next level.

80
The Line of Best Fit

Sound Ancestors isn’t anything new from Madlib, but it only further cements his status as one of the great producers, artists, and minds in hip-hop.

80
Rolling Stone

The wildly inventive rapper-producer teams up with electronic musician Four Tet to create an album that lives in the space between the past and the future.

80
Mojo

Nourishing batch of beat collages from the leftfield hip-hop auteur, assisted here by Kieran ‘Four Tet’ Hebden.

80
God Is in the TV

Whilst there are less immediate areas of the tracklist, there is a good proportion of showstoppers and every track has its place in the overall effort.  This is an LP that builds, getting better the longer it goes on.

79
Pitchfork
On his collaborative album with Four Tet’s Kieran Hebden, the producer, multi-instrumentalist, DJ, and archivist remains masterful by simply turning what he hears into something new and revelatory.
70
AllMusic

It sounds recognizably like both Madlib and Four Tet while taking their music into directions where neither artist has ventured before, and its highlights are life-affirming.

70
Exclaim!

Sound Ancestors is a mixed bag if ever there was one. It's funky, it's psychedelic, it's jazzy, dirty, clean, and mean. It's Madlib.

70
The Needle Drop

Sound Ancestors trails off into averageness by Madlib standards, which is to say it never stops being above average in general.

70
Albumism

Madlib is known for his psychedelic, positively weird concoctions, and he delivers a few on Sound Ancestors.

60
Spectrum Culture
In a world where more and more people think throwing a few old-timey samples together qualifies as jazz-hop, it’s needed more than ever for the elite producers to show the young bucks the true heights of artful, imaginative hip-hop beat making.
pizzagrande
23

ipad music be like

JacksonLerner
77

madlib’s collaboration with four tet’s kieran hebden does not disappoint.

even in 2021, madlib is one of the best producers out there. his latest album is full of organized instrumentals and ingenious results.

throughout ‘sound ancestors’, many vibes are present. this foray is less into the hip-hop culture and more working toward a fusion of soul, funk, jazz, and electronic. there’s spanish guitar on “latino negro”, jamaican influence on “theme ... read more

Case
70

This could have been a classic...but it's still an enjoyable release.

Madlib is one of my favorite producers, and I really liked the singles for this album, so I had high expectations. And while I do enjoy this quite a bit, it didn’t reach its full potential for me.

For what it is, it’s actually really well executed and sounds great. Madlib has some great instrumentals on here and some really cool ideas overall. But unlike my favorite instrumental records, it doesn’t ... read more

regalitooo
70

flows pretty well

ReviewForFun
40

Madlib made these beats????? Really don't sound like it.

Top 5 Tracks: The New Normal (Best), Chino, Hang Out (Phone Off), The Call, Riddim Chant

100

Great

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Added on: October 25, 2020