Is Ellipsis

Holy shit, a rap album from 2003 that could almost be from 1991. Beats-wise it's *very* old school, but the rapping is a bit more modern. Still, the Ice-T influence is clear as day. Update at end: ok, this was really cool. If modern rap sounded more like this and less like fucking Drake or whatever, I'd listen to a lot more of it. 4/5.

Ok, first things first: neither this album nor this band have a Wikipedia entry. That needs to be rectified PRONTO, not just for their Jurassic-5-esque ATL hip-hop bad-assery, but also for their association with early Aughts Adult Swim realness. Second, the scratch-wizardry on display on this album gave me Mixmaster Mike, Jam Master Jay (RIP), and even The Avalanches. Mix that with a flow reminiscent (and contemporary) of Eminem, and you’ve got a forgotten gem. Thank you, Astute Listener Who Submitted This Disc. You have me buzzing with the beat.

A nice, punchy hip-hop LP with some fun mixing elements that made it feel unique. Could've tightened up a bit and dropped to a lean, mean 40 minutes, but even as it is this is a fun listen. I enjoyed how there seemed to be a constant dialogue between the MC and the DJ, made the album feel more organic and contributed a genuineness that set this apart from other hip-hop efforts.

This is my favorite flavor of hip hop, tons of samples and DJ work, linguistic gymnastics, and a little bit silly feeling. Good stuff

Just some excellent rapping over slick as hell beats. This is exactly the kind of thing that keeps me coming back to this website after 4 and 1/2 years

Not my usual style. Unlikely to come back to. However, Wow!!! That was awesome. Musically interesting. Lyrically interesting. Captivating flow. Great production.

This was really great from a group that I have never heard of before. Loved it, will listen again and check out more of their work. Nice add!

A lot of clever and easygoing flow. This style to me sometimes gets mired in an engaging and genial but somewhat flattened and monotonous groove. And this suffers some of that but generally kept things smart and funny enough to keep from dropping into the background. Some strong reminiscence of Handsome Boy Modelling School, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Total surprise. This was great.

This was an enjoyable listen - Hip Hop isn't always my jam but this was a lot of fun, and when I caught the lyrics I was impressed. Good stuff!

Pretty cool turntable-heavy hip-hop with some weird and funky beats. It reminds me quite a bit of Deltron 3030 though the sampling chops are almost Madvillain-esque at times, while At Last felt like a boom bap classic. Some motifs were maybe repeated a bit too much and a couple of the skits fell flat for me, but otherwise it was an adventurous and enjoyable record

This is the type of hip hop I love. This was great. I'm surprised it's as obscure and unknown as it seems to be, because it just has that energy of an album that would be big in the online music circles, next to stuff like Deltron 3030 and Madvillainy.

This was tight - appreciate the suggestion!

This is the kinda hiphop I really enjoy. Old school yet still sounds fun. Good flow. Given how this group seems to have had no impact on the mindustry or genre as a whole, I'd have to lean to a slight no to not include them. My personal rating: 4/5 My rating relative to the list: 4/5 Should this have been included on the original list? Slight no.

Liked it a lot

Pretty good, and completely new to me. A really good suggestion

My favorite style of hip hop from a group previously unknown to me = win. Psyche Origami features some terrific turntablism and beat-making, paired with some great flow and lyricism from MC Wyzsztyk/Mr. Wizard. Could use a little more variety or diverse voices to match up to my faves like J5 and Dilated Peoples, but "Is Ellipsis" is a solid offering that had me bopping for 50 minutes.

Had never heard of this, and both this artist and album do not have Wikipedia pages, so I wasn't expecting much. But this was excellent. Great flow, sounded like something from early 1990s rather than early 2000s. Really enjoyed this. Great selection!

Very neat, albeit a bit predictable and doesn't have a whole lot of it's own ideas, but I do really like what's here. Just don't use this as an excuse to brush off any other modern rap, okay?

So sure, Psyche Origami were quite late to the game when it comes to laidback jazz-infused hip hop, here going back to the Native Tongues or Digable Planets-like eras (with some admittedly more noughts-adjacent flourishes here and there...). But who really cares about that now huh? Especially when the more "experimental" songs in the middle of this record's tracklist are so excellent. Those unsung gems are "The Wharf Song", "At Last" and "Dead Right" (the latter displaying a moody jazz piano loop that's so smooth and melancholic I instantly wanted to know who had been sampled there!). And beyond those jewels, everything sounds good, lively and on point for the genre anyway. Many thanks to the user who selected those (virtually unknown) rap artists. I love your reviews, by the way. Always short and yet very, very often on point, once again. The exact opposite to my overlong rants. Looks like I need to take a page out of your own (origami) book... In the meantime, I don't know if this album can make the fold and thus be included in my own list of essential 1001 albums. But on paper, at least, it could be. 3.5/5 for the purposes of this list of essential albums, rounded up to 4. 8.5/10 for more general purposes (5 + 3.5) ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 57 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 77 (including this one) Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 140 --- Émile. Ça y est, j'ai *enfin* répondu (en deux temps). Tu trouveras ça sous les reviews des disques de Blackalicious et Alexisonfire au dessus.

This album did not make me very happy. It's sort of old-school, but also very outdated hip hop. The breaks on this long album are similar on the tracks and the production sounds late 1990s. The constantly returning Psyche Origami phrase got on my nerves. It's not bad, but in the end quite boring.

It was ok for a hiphop album

A good conscience lyrically forward rap album with some retro beats and smooth samples. They definitely go with a more 90s style with this album with a little bit of flair. This is kinda like a madlib produced album. Lyrically it’s not as strong as some other conscious rap albums but it’s not bad. 6.5/10

Rating: 6/10 Best songs: At last

Pretty smooth hip-hop rap, with a obviously some pretty well crafted songs. Its not entirely my style but the lyrical strength makes the listen worth while.

Why not more popular?

I enjoyed the throwback vibe of this album. I don't think there were any real standout tracks that I would come back to, but it was a fun listen.

Soild hip hop album, great flow.

This type of quirky, jazzy hip-hop is a treat. However I do recall that having a wikipedia page was a criterion for albums being chosen 🤓☝️

Hip-hop sin estridencias, sin mucho que añadir o de resaltar. Un disco más del montón de un estilo ya conocido. Se deja escuchar, pero con la sensación de haberlo escuchado ya en alguna otra ocasión

I'm going to try and give this credit for being a throwback to a different era in its time, but for me it just all sounded the same.

Honestly very middle of the road. Nothing was bad, nothing was great. It was all, mostly, good. Flow, samples, lyrics, production. Nothing to really write home about. A little dated by 2003 standards and the skits were a bit much, but otherwise, just a solid album. 3/5

Nice

Good to hear that a hip hop album can be made without gratuitous over use of obscenities.

Really solid old school style hip-hop. The beats are super clean and the constant vocal swapping is really well done. I think it would benefit from some more unique sounding vocalists but otherwise it was really enjoyable.

Old skool interesting hop hop.

Old School hip hop made just a little too late? Yes please!

It's really hard to sound original these days, and I believe they achieved a good level of originality as far as I can see. It's not exactly hip-hop, nor is it pure electronic music, but it's enjoyable overall.

Hip-hop. Rollo. Un 2.

Started off okay then turned to shite

Is Ellipsis is just fine. Early 90s beats but a decade later gives it a retro sound, as does the flow that seems to try to pack as many words and as verbose a vocabulary as possible into each song; that's fine now and then but it gets old pretty quickly, it's done to show off rather than to tell a story or to communicate properly, and it ends up coming off exactly that way. DJ/sampling is the strongest part of this, it's really well done, high 2/5, nothing really good, nothing terrible, just wish it was a more diverse sound across the whole thing, particularly on the mic.

They’re really into their name apparently. They say it in every damn song.

I don’t like most hip hop. This was no exception.

Nuff Teef weirds me out so much 1