Zulu in "Zulu is dead"

Zulu - "A New Tomorrow"
Label: Flatspot Records

 

Does anyone remember DE LA SOUL's "De la Soul is dead" from 1991? The Hip-Hop-collective was in their prime around this time and their second full length had the potential to be an alltime classic. However, it was stuffed with skits like not many albums are. They've gotten to the point where those skits and interludes covered all the great stuff that was going on (and it was a lot of great stuff!) in a big black cloud. There wasn't much left anymore besides and overly long album (74 minutes) with lots of potential... 

...when I checked out the long awaited debut full length by ZULU it was immediately clear to me, that the HC/Metalcore-collective suffers from the same disease. Yeah, "ZULU is dead". That's for sure. They fill you up with intros, interludes and outros until you pop off! They start their ride with an intro named "Africa", and the next two songs get outros. "Music to Driveby", the fourth track, is a 35-second-attack before they drift into a Soul-arrangement for the rest of the time. When they get rolling with their HC/Metalcore/Beatdown-formula, they are one of the best doing it right now - just listen to the already familiar "Where I'm from" or the neckbreaker "Fakin' tha Funk" following suit. They take a time-out for three minutes with "Shine Eternally", a lounge-y, easy-listening interplay, that gets followed by an interlude of voice samples. Here's where they get to the center-piece of their album with the phrase of "Must I only share my Pain", that gets picked up two more times. First with a cool and moody poetry performed by Aleisia Miller. Secondly with the previously released and quality Hip-Hop-track "We're more than this" in the tradition of acts like A TRIBE CALLED QUEST or THE ROOTS. The end of the record bascially is the longest non-bullshit-HC-phase of the whole record, with "52 Fatal Strikes" and "Divine Intervention" being straight, but also very differential rippers. The closer "Who Jah Bless, No One Curse" starts off aggressively and fast, but (as you already know) halfway through it slides into the soulful outro of the album... and somehow that outro gets another outro... yeah, that's how "ZULU is dead", pardon "A New Tomorrow" works...

So they ruined their own debut full length with all those interludes, right? They did it just like DE LA SOUL did it 32 years ago?! Rrrrrrrright? No, wrong. Dead wrong. ZULU succeeded with the interlude-heavy formula, and in a really rare case they upped the quality of the whole record. Honestly, if they'd have stuck to their Beatdown-stuff, they'd have written another EMMURE-record. The Beatdown-part on "A New Tomorrow" is cool, but it's not overdone. They do way more over the span of these 25+ minutes and prove a lot of musicality. From Soul to Hip-Hop, from R'n'B to Easty-Listening/Lounge to African Folk, from sensitive lyricism to boasts of pure aggression, they cover a lot of ground and also deliver the goods in terms of pure HC/Beatdown/Powerviolence. I get some HC-purists who will moan about the flow of the album, that's legit, but to me personally I find their formula pretty entertaining. But that's the thing with recrods like these and there are basically no more ways then those two ways: You either feel it or you don't. 

To me "A New Tomorrow" is a clear triumph, especially for a debut full length. These guys have a lot more in store, that's for sure. As for now, ZULU isn't dead. 

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