But where White channels his ideas into paradoxical analog gadgetry, Mos Def sang the praises of Nina Simone on a song that turns into barreling hardcore punk. One of rap's most enigmatic figures then and now, think of Smith like Jack White, an artist who loves history so much he has to mess with it. But where Kweli has always adhered strictly to the boom-bap, Mos Def indeed showed another side of himself just a year later. The duo's explanatory "Astronomy (8th Light)" spends the entire song doing just that: "Blacker than the seed in the blackberry pie / Blacker than the middle of my eye," "Black like the perception of who on welfare," et cetera.
And redefining both "blackness" and hip-hop was present in their work from the git. The Bed-Stuy polymath came to the world’s attention in 1998 with his fellow wordsmith Talib Kweli for just one album as Black Star, appropriately titled Mos Def &Talib Kweli Are Black Star. But those two sides might be "past" and "future," with who else but the man currently known as Yasiin Bey adjoining them. When Dante Smith titled his solo debut Black On Both Sides two decades ago this week, he may not have been thinking about time.
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