Ghostface Killah: Supreme Clientele 2

"You would be forgiven if the first couplet had you fooled. On "Iron Man," the opening song from Supreme Clientele 2-the titles of two masterpieces leveraged, diminished, thrown into the SEO fire- Ghostface Killah headfakes like he really has something. "The stamp on the dope was Ronald Reagan with fronts," he raps, the kind of absurdist and hyperspecific detail that dotted the crime vignettes from the illustrious first half of his career."

"That the rest of "Iron Man," and the rest of Supreme Clientele 2, falls far short of this standard should not be a surprise; it's an extraordinary image. And the album is certainly not the nadir for late-period Ghost, who over the last decade has frequently sounded strained and depleted, and who has spent significant time of late writing in staid formats that are poor vehicles for his once phantasmagoric style."

Supreme Clientele 2 opens with "Iron Man," which delivers vivid, absurdist, hyperspecific imagery that recalls earlier crime vignettes. Most subsequent tracks fail to sustain that inventiveness, producing an album that leans heavily on nostalgia and retrospective framing. Ghostface Killah's vocal timbre has shifted from frenetic and wild to gruffer and scratchier, reducing the immediacy of his delivery. Frequent vocal doubling and changes in recording approach further distance the performance from earlier magic. The record still offers sturdiness and occasional fun, but its backward gaze and diminished vocal presence limit its impact.

Read at Pitchfork