You probably know Bishop Nehru as the promising protégé to MF DOOM’s sinister sensei. He’s that New York kid with the looping flows, internal rhyme patterns, and taste for vintage East Coast beats that caught the ear of the masked supervillain. But hip-hop history teaches us that you rely on DOOM at your peril. With his mentor mostly off the grid since the release of NehruvianDOOM, their undercooked 2014 collaboration, Bishop has been searching for new direction. His short tenure on Nas’ Mass Appeal Records more or less came to nothing, while unconvincing attempts to stylistically mutate—as with the clunky sci-fi sounds of 2016’s Magic 19—have just underlined the need for more senior advisors.
His 2017 mixtape Emperor Nehru’s New Groove showcased an increasingly confident star, with Bishop rapping comfortably on everything from dusty, old-school loops to murkier modern sounds. Now, with the 21-year-old’s official solo debut, he’s throwing his machine fully into reverse and leaning toward the throwback New York style he made his name on.
Elevators: Act I & II’s 10 full tracks are split into two distinct halves: The first, subtitled “Ascension,” features fresh production from Kaytranada, while the second, “Free Falling,” reunites him with his prodigal father figure, DOOM. The idea seems to be that Nehru’s personality is similarly divided—the positivity versus the depravity. But the tangible differences between his mood, subject matter, and delivery on the two sets of tracks are so subtle that it’s hard to see this as a worthwhile concept.
It’s mostly down to the two beatmakers, then, to differentiate the record’s sides. The 25-year-old Kaytranada wasn't born yet when DOOM dropped his first album with KMD in 1991, but he’s still up to the challenge of making vintage beats that pick up where the Native Tongues school left off. Take “No Idea,” the best song on Side A: It’s not difficult to picture Q-Tip riding the symphonious sample. The lyrics are as personal as any Nehru has written, as he lays out the hardships he’s endured, covering bouts of depression, homelessness, and industry bullshit. “I walked through hell, now I’m inventin’ the heaven,” he raps triumphantly. The theme could easily come through as hackneyed, but the catharsis palpable in Nehru’s voice as he lays it all out there is undoubtedly moving.
DOOM’s contributions to Elevators: Act I & II suggest that his interest in the project was probably limited. As with NehruvianDOOM, a lot of these beats are old or have been recycled from other places. It’s a little disappointing that Nehru didn’t seek all-original instrumentation for his first solo studio LP, but these are still very good DOOM tracks. The zany laser gun sounds and boom-bap drums of “Again & Again” encapsulate the intersection of underground New York rap and Saturday morning cartoons that has long been the producer’s strongest realm.
Nehru raps well on these cuts. His flow is fluid on the cosmic squiggles of “Rollercoasting” and the smoky, jazz-saxophone-led “Rooftops.” But if the album’s second half is supposed to represent the brooding side of his personality, then the content feels way off. Where his tutor can be gloriously malicious on the mic, Nehru comes off as a schoolyard bully in comparison. One-liners such as “Like doctors with anorexia, my patience is thin,” from “Again & Again,” aren’t so much malevolent as they are silly. And the hooks throughout this section leave such little impression, he probably would have been better off taking DOOM’s lead and largely dispensing with the idea of a chorus.
In the press notes, Nehru calls this album his attempt at creating “a rap Pet Sounds.” But Elevators: Act I & II is just too thin, too lacking in both scope and lateral thinking to warrant comparison to the Beach Boys’ ambitious leap. Nehru’s significant talents are all on display, but it’s tough to thrive in such tight margins.
