Album Review: Gil-Scott Heron - Im New Here

Gil Scott-Heron is considered one of the pioneers of hip-hop, with his poetry of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and later explorations of funk and hip-hop having lasting influence for his lyrical dexterity and political self-expression. His most famous song ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ became his signature tune and a sloganeering cliché, and has been referenced by artists as diverse as Public Enemy, Pulp and Steve Earle. I’m New Here is Scott-Heron’s first studio album for sixteen years, and is almost a starting over for a man who has been plagued in recent years by cocaine addiction, jail-time, and HIV rumours. But if the colour scheme of the front cover is anything to go by too – a sly dig at the pink and green of Elvis Presley’s culturally controversial debut album (e.g. like Elvis, this album is announcing ‘I’m new here’) – Scott-Heron hasn’t lost his sense of bite.

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