Current Music Blog

On “Universal Mind Control,” Common tried out more “futuristic” and otherworldly ideas, beats, and imagery to push himself and take his music to places he hadn’t previously explored. Working with Pharrell Williams of producing duo The Neptunes played a huge part, since Pharrell is no stranger to enthusiasm for outer space themes and ideas. From his music label Star Trak, to his clothing lines, Billionaire Boys Club and Ice Cream featuring an astronaut as its mascot, and even citing scientist Carl Sagan as someone he really admires, Pharrell is often pushing creativity toward an interplanetary future. (Watch Pharrell talk to Current about his creative community ARTST here.) The first single and title track from Common’s “Universal Mind Control” is a perfect example of that.

But Pharrell and Common aren’t the only artists in hip-hop to focus attentions on off-world conquest. It’s been a source of inspiration and a big topic for a lot of emcees and producers in recent years especially. Since the beginning of his mainstream career, Kanye West has talked about escaping in a “Spaceship”, and his entire 2008 Glow In The Dark tour hinged on a plot line where he’d been traveling the unknown to find the meaning and inspiration that Earth had failed to provide.

A 2008 Slate magazine article suggested that the black “Afronaut” has roots all the way in the earlier 1900s. But young music fans and bloggers have suggested that what it makes appealing in most recent history—though even that extends back to Afrika Bambaataaa’s “Planet Rock” in the 1980s—is being able to identify with “the alien Superman.” There’s something relatable in the isolation of outer space existence, and then using that same “otherness” to present ordinary Earth with material that’s both unique and heroic, thanks to the grandness that comes along with huge spacecrafts delivering lifesaving resources that people need.

New artist Kid Cudi fits right into that idea with his debut, “Man on the Moon: End of the Day” (narrated by none other than…Common). The isolation of the space agent is crux of the album, and Cudi says that space as a concept appealed to him even as a child—going from traveling to his own world in his imagination to placing himself there more definitely as an artist.

And while popular hip-hop artists may not have their songs blasted in space like McFly, if that time N.A.S.A commissioned a hip-hop song about astrobiology and Snoop Doog and Talib Kweli working with Buzz Aldrin to create Funny or Die’s “Rocket Experience” are any indication, the fascination still seems pretty mutual.

Watch this exclusive Embedded Outtake where Common talks about Kanye’s influence on his music:

And tune into Embedded tonight at 11/10c to hear Common talk about all the influences in his work.

UPDATE: Hear Common and Pharrell talk about creating a new sound for Common’s album, Universal Mind Control.