Modern Review: Generational Curse

Score: 4.5/5 | Released: March 24th, 2023

Written By: Anthony Seaman      

   Chaos is an unquestioned piece of the best West Coast releases ever made. The overlapping storylines within a house party, escaping or causing drive by’s, rule breaking feats of the human language, or 24-hour documentaries through the lives of those seen as America’s most dangerous never are consistent. The consistency is the inconsistency. There’s always time to party, to laugh, cry, scream to the heavens. Bass lines pulse, samples screech, drums go a mile a millisecond or a mile an hour. ICECOLDBISHOP may be the best at harnessing this chaos of any rapper the West Coast has ever seen. He gives classic tales of hard drug use and gun violence, but reframes it not as stories of pure violence, but before and after tales. Generational Curse has been sitting on the shelf for years, with only light tweaks across the pandemic punching it up to be what it is today. Capturing the fears of walking into treacherous territory as the sun goes down, the production is thick with darkness. Who or what will pop from around the corner next is unknown, every bass line and kick regrounds you while BISHOP zooms up and down the musical scale with his voice.Take A Daytrip retreat from the pop-rap crossover world of Lil Nas X back to their roots as hip-hops elite stadium shakers. Kenny Beats, Kal Banx, Mr. Carmack stand out with their one-off placements, but the trio of Jeremy Uribe, BREGMA, and Kyla Moscovich appear as co-producers across the album hemming tight and loose ends that could break you out of this cinematic record. 

        BISHOP is as nimble of a speaker as they come. He pushes his voice from the gruffness of a superior to a squawk fit for a zoo animal. He’s the Kyrie of vocal manipulation; everything you imagine doing by yourself when you’re singing along seems plausible, until you actually try it. Much like Kyrie, BISHOP is doing it at the highest level with seemingly no resistance. It’s hard work, it’s patience, but that final tier of mastery requires a special invitation from God to enter. It ramps up his storytelling, making the same LA tales movies, podcasts and other albums have taken as source material, but with new depth. You can trace the deepening and eventual rising of his delivery best on “OUT THE WINDOW”, where the bends come in waves. From near drunken rumbles to breathless stabs he flexes a linguistic range from point A to point B like no other working rapper can. Tune out for 10 seconds and you’re in a whole new part of South Central, still in go mode like you were previously but with a whole new set of problems. 

Like everyone in the neighborhood, he’s never just a simple bystander, he’s a conscious participant. Pills and liquor are in his system, and it’s because he’s learned it from everyone around him, who learned it from their people and so on. Murder isn’t just a senseless act over a misunderstanding, you take ours and we take yours, regardless of the repercussions. The closing verse of “CANDLELIGHT” breaks down the cold side of being an OG, consciously manipulating fresh faces in the crew to commit crimes you caused from the comfort of your couch. The starkest of them all may be “TIL THE END” where BISHOP speaks on children and teenaged victims being just as bad the grown folks. “Whole lotta niggas you think die for nothing / die for something / you don’t know why cause we don’t tell our side to the public / nobody aint really innocent / that little boy at 16 you see with the book bag / he really out here killing shit”. What do you say when you see passing down traditions is damaging progression? Rage fires out of his mouth on "CURSED", as the pent up frustrations materialize into an open invitation to be a front line solider. BISHOP’s answer is retelling the tales with a kind of clarity that isn’t perspective based, but rather from a rooftop above it all.  Generational Curse is a low stakes version of good kid, m.A.A.d. city with the production values of DAMN., more specifically the twitchier anthems like “ELEMENT” and “m.A.A.d. city”. Is he the main character through this LP? Vividly speaking on his family members' addiction issues and murders make him the star, but based on the environment he’s detailing you could swap out the name but the story stays the same.

        The ingredients that are used to make the West Coast gumbo are so distinct that it’s become harder to splash in new ingredients. We adore Blxst for throwing a Don Toliver filter over landscapes Young Slo-Be and Drakeo co-molded, and Kendrick was deified for being the first to synthesize every West Coast movement into 2 albums. California is more insular than any other region, MC Ren was able to get Platinum Certified off an EP that hardly circulated in stores outside of the state. Any outside influence is appreciated, because at this point in time it’s hard to spin the Blood vs. Crip anthology with any new eye popping details. Performances from Busta Rhymes, Busdriver and E-40 feel soaked into the DNA of BISHOP intentionally or not. He’s spoken highly of G-Unit and Kendrick in interviews, and the face breaking force of real life matches that of those acts, and that is enough of a twist to keep the formula fresh. He feels poised to slip right into the West Coast ecosystem, already working with Alchemist, Reason and Ab-Soul while wrapping himself in the ecosystems of Rico Nasty and AG Club to keep new ideas flowing. The greatness of BISHOP isn’t in what he says, but how he says it. The pulses of his vocal chords seep the words into the back of your brain like the omnipresent fear of the sky falling. He’s a performer first, but one that has a sense of purpose to display his life and the lives of those around him unselfishly. It’s not about what they do or have done or are plotting on doing to their fellow man, but how did we get here? Can it ever stop if we set it out so plainly in front of our eyes?

Best Song: "FOCUSED"

Best Beat: "OUT THE WINDOW"

Best Moments: The speedy jazz section of "FOCUSED" / Verse 1 of "I CANT SWIM" / The blown out vocals on "CURSED" / The singing in the car interlude on "CANDLELIGHT"