Ex-Pitchfork writer James Wisdom done a bad deed with his review of Anti-Pop Consortium's first album. Tragic Epilogue a 6.5? It's not some underground classic, but their mix of sharp rhythms and relentless rhymes made for a tight debut, even if it left a cold, chemical aftertaste. I'm not coming all "saviors of hip-hop"-- Wisdom had a point: too many loops made for monotonous grooves, and their dense wordflow tried too hard to intimidate. Overly bleak maybe, but not surprising; hell, Anti-Popper Beans even cites Bauhaus and Section 25 as influences. But along with Mike Ladd's Parliament-ary Afterfuture and the Infesticons' Gun Hill Road, Tragic Epilogue was one of those mindtrip albums of 2000 that could send you to a heaven at least somewhere in the 7.0s.

So hopefully we can give props to the Consortium while avoiding some internecine staffer warfare. Anti-Pop's on Warp now, and for a second you might think the label's looking to duplicate the success of Cannibal Ox. "Tuff Gong" fires off rattling tin can percussion and a raw, bombastic bassline reminiscent of everything on The Cold Vein. M. Sayid spits some typical insults at first, but then the song cuts to this organic double-bass skronk and he doubletimes, tongue almost audibly flapping. He balances precariously, nearly losing it, but ends on point with, "You pulled out a nine/ I turned into a green light and ran over your mind."

"Tuff Gong" is clearly an intro track, and "Splinter" follows seamlessly with some duke-duke-duke of earl-style vocals and a nice, understated keyboard melody. Beans' warm voice begins, "Fillin' em with penicillin and Benadryl/ Drillin' a fillin' and spillin' my feelings." His delivery's always smooth but I'm struck by the excitement-- nobody's detached like the last joint. Likewise, M. Sayid snarls eagerly, "I got crowds movin' like U.N. flags." Somebody's got to fall off though, and here, it's High Priest. You can pinpoint right when his freestyle degenerates into a bastardized Kool-Keith grocery-list recitation, the kind of flat flow that heads always hate in "progressive" hip-hop.

But Priest redeems-- regular Anti-Pop producer Earl Blaize steps back to the engineer role for this EP, and each of the three MCs get a chance to shine on their own tracks. Priest proves the skills that got him on Mille Plateaux's click-hop comps. He crafts "39303" from random beeps and babbling samples, mixing it all together suddenly as Beans launches into an abstract monologue. It cuts off too quickly, probably the only problem with this EP: most tracks just seem sketches. But Priest's next piece, "Pit," distracts attention once again with an instrumental full of divebombing pitchshifts that squeak like Kraftwerkian birds of paradise. Beans' "Dystopian Disco Force" and M. Sayid's "Perpendicular" go the more mainstream route. The latter develops into a DJ Muggs-style trip-hop ditty, and the former is straight-up funk, organ runs and wah-wah guitars included.

Were there any instrumentals at all on Tragic Epilogue? Must have slept through them, if so. But this EP just constantly keeps your head bobbing. They've extended the challenges of vocal freestyle to the music, and the improvised weirdness avoids the dull loops Epilogue fell into. "Vector" ends with another vocal track and the upbeat meter is perfect (likewise the buoyant, humming Moog). The Consortium seems to have learned that Anti-Pop doesn't equal mind-numbing, machine-like music. I'm just hoping the experimental tip transfers to their new album in 2002. The Ends Against the Middle is only a 17-minute EP, but unlike their fast-forward-guy logo, when this finishes, I'm ready to rewind.

-Christopher Dare, December 20th, 2001