Reflection Eternal Revolutions Per Minute

• RPM’s
• Back Again feat. Res
• City Playgrounds
• Strangers feat. Bun B
• In This World
• Got Work (Fame)
• Midnight Hour feat. Estelle
• In the Red
• Lift’in Off
• Black Gold Intro (The Black Gold Countdown)
• Ballad of the Black Gold
• Just Begun feat. Jay Electronica, J. Cole and Mos Def
• Long Hot Summer
• Get Loose feat. Chester French
• So Good
• Ends feat. Bilal
• Outro

Revolutions Per Minute is an album hip-hop heads have been drooling over since Reflection Eternal's classic Train of Thought dropped in 2000. That seminal album from Talib Kweli and Hi-Tek marked what would be the beginning of underground rap label Rawkus' eventual downfall. And, like the label, it seemed as if we also saw the end of this producer/rapper duo. There was no bad blood or anything like that. Kweli and Hi-Tek appeared together on their respective solo albums, but the Train of Thought follow-up was nowhere to be found. Then, in 2008, everything changed. Revolutions Per Minute went from rumor to reality when Kweli announced he was recording with Hi-Tek as Reflection Eternal. And the album's leaked singles -- upbeat jam "Back Again" and posse cut banger "Just Begun" with J. Cole, Mos Def, and Jay Electronica -- prove that while their sound has developed into something new, Kweli and Hi-Tek's chemistry remains intact.

Abstract by Andrew Martin