Rebel

As a devoted Christian, Lecrae’s primary goal is to glorify Jesus Christ, but as a believer in the power of Southern hip-hop, he wants to make the music that appeals to himself and his generation. Rebel does a surprisingly powerful job of bridging those two seemingly incompatible worlds. Unlike most Christian albums, the music here is as authentic and heavy as anything on Young Jeezy’s last album, only rather than describe life in the trap house, Lecrae rhymes about life in the Lord’s house: “Already dead so forget my flesh,” he says in “Go Hard.” “I done been crossed over see the full court press / I’m a full court mess if the Lord don’t use me / Running from my trials thinkin’ everything’s groovy.” Rather than simply rattle off Bible verses, Lecrae analyzes stories from his personal experience, and shows the insecurity and unhappiness that lie just underneath the material excesses and self-pleasure of modern hip-hop culture. Rebel is smart and passionate, but more importantly it doesn’t condescend to its target audience. As long as Lecrae continues to speak to his peers on their own terms he’s bound to have more people listening.