This feeling manifests itself with Bey’s listless lyrical “performance.” He continues his mumbling lounge-singer shtick he created a decade ago, barely coherent as he murmurs faux-profound lyrics on nine tracks.

Most of the bad is an extension of the palpable sense that Bey barely felt like bothering with recording this album.

Presumably the best thing that can be said about the album is that at 31 minutes in length, it doesn’t waste too much of the listener’s time. But whereas True Magic was about Mos/Yasiin getting free from Geffen Records, December 99th is the first step in him getting free from his career in the arts, and man, does he sound like he really doesn’t want to be here.

99th and recording this passion-less snoozefest of an album.ĭecember 99th is the spiritual sequel to True Magic. The pair connected after Bey expressed his admiration for Sheppard’s work, leading to the two forming the group Dec. The first of three “retirement” albums, December 99th is a collaboration with Ferrari Sheppard, a Chicago-based journalist and activist best known for his Stop Being Famous and A Country Called Earth websites. It would also be easy to spend thousands of words talking about the subsequent fall, because if nothing else, it would prevent you from talking about his latest album, December 99th. Yasiin announced his retirement from film and music. It all culminated earlier this year when Mos a.k.a. Then there were the embarrassing international issues involving South Africa, where he took up residence in recent years and attempted to use a “World Passport” to reenter the country. He became a deeply involved political activist, but there were also the embarrassing paternity cases and subpar live performances. He rebounded during the late ’00s with a few strong guest appearances and The Ecstatic (2009), a much stronger entry into his discography that showed that when Mos gave a fuck, he could still make damn good music.īut in the years following The Ecstatic, Mos, now going by Yasiin Bey, made more headlines for what he was getting into off record than on record. While New Danger was a bloated, over-ambitious mess, True Magic sounded like a phoned-in attempt to fulfill his contract with Geffen Records. Both 2004’s The New Danger and 2006’s True Magic were missteps for different reasons.

Even as Mos’ film career flourished in the early ’00s, he stumbled musically. It would be easy to spend thousands of words talking about those early days, because if nothing else, it would prevent you from having to think about the subsequent fall.

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