Jerusalaam Come by Juice Aleem

My first solo album is now back in rotation.

After a swarm of songs and releases with Gamma, Shadowless and New Flesh I decided to finally get back to my own thing with the one Ebu Blackitude on the boards for the most part.

It was a real long time coming and a long time to make, I tend to only make my own projects when in the right frame of mind and motion.

Recorded in studios, bedrooms and spare rooms across the UK and featuring Shadowless family such as Tomo and Ebu himself it was a true moment of glory to see it launched.

Released on CD by Big Dada it was always a thing to come back to and re-release in other formats.

Here it is and also a few choice quotes from it's overwhelming critical acclaim. It was critical in many ways as even those who enjoyed the album found me a lot to take on.

I can be a lot to take on but I will that you take this album in the manner it was intended, from here till Jerusalaam Come:

"Juice Aleem's 2009 classic Jerusalaam Come is one of my favourite hip-hop albums by anyone. Ever." - Tom Robinson - BBC6 Music

"Juice Aleem, with his gusto and fuego, is a shocker, a true verbal wit and one whose grasp of balance and weight in his sentences is expert. A fixation with the unjust and with righting wrongs provides the majority of inspiration here, but it is never tempered by ill-informed ranting." - Daniel Ross - The Quietus.

"Juice Aleem, long-acknowledged as one of the finest MCs the UK has ever produced, finally goes solo. The sometime New Flesh and Gamma frontman who has also worked with Coldcut, Hextstatic, Evil 9 and Adam Freedland amongst many, many others, has decided that at last it's time to go for self. "Jerusalaam Come" is the result - thirteen tracks of varied beats and broad musical influences held together by Juice's unique lyrical style and mental dexterity. Largely produced by Gamma/Shadowless legend Blackitude, it's an album which is both as raw and as sophisticated as the minds who have made it. This Is Not For Everyone, If you're not interested in lyrical intelligence, in hip hop, in MCs with something to say, in Blackitude's skank-funk, in ragged intellect, in ideas, in difference, in coming correct, then you may as well give it a miss. It's an over-used phrase, but in terms of what hip hop is supposed to be about, Juice Aleem is the real deal. If you prefer the fake deal, the trendy bullshit, constant novelty without substance, then turn off now."

"Much like Big Dada labelmate Roots Manuva, Aleem has a skill for blending the everyday colloquial with the deep spiritual. The first standout track here is The Fallen (Gen. 15 13), a dense, mystic-tinged number that sees him spitting a personal, remarkably lyrical take on holy scripture over elegiac piano and snaking bass: ''The pre-Babel, antedivulian pre-natal/The language we use right now, it proves fatal''. The Killer's Tears, meanwhile, sounds something like the Wu-Tang Clan by way of Birmingham, all sword swipes and eerie, cinematic organs." - Louis Patterson - BBC Review

"His defiant staccato delivery somewhere between Pharoahe Monch and Dizzee Rascal, and a lyrical style which excels both inside and roundabout the beat, it was little surprise that his solo debut, 2009's JERUSALAAM COME, would ravenously gather up critical praise. Juice's flows are persistent--equal parts reggae toaster, raconteur, and huckster." - Jason Thurston, allmusic.com

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