In Common’s latest album, hip-hop is street scripture

The Auditorium Vol. 1

Common & Pete Rock (Loma Vista, 2024)

Theologian Alejandro Nava argues that hip hop should be considered engraced “street scriptures.” Yet, by and large, most Catholics still do not listen to hip hop, and that’s a shame. At its best, hip hop weaves together the sacred and the secular into a living, breathing, playful, sonic force. It encompasses beats and rhythms that affect your soul while spitting lyrics that can awaken your deepest humanity.

Lonnie Rashid Lynn—stage name Common—has sought to do this for decades. Along with his peers, mentors, and proteges, he has remained dedicated to a vision of hip hop as love-saturated virtuosity. He had fallen off my radar in recent years, but then he collaborated with one of the godfathers of hip-hop, Pete Rock, and magic happened: The Auditorium Vol. 1.

On the opening track, “Dreamin’,” Common intones, “From the stellar regions of the soul” and then plays off a sample from Aretha Franklin as he recounts encounters with luminaries in the Black tradition. From there, the next 14 tracks are a masterclass in musical alchemy as he collaborates with a who’s who of musicians while name dropping and even sampling a who’s who of intellectuals.

On the sublime “We’re on our Way,” Common reminds us: “Our destination is constant elevation / You could tell the nation / We on the rise through the lows and the highs / Tell the world to recognize / We’ve only just begun . . .”

On “A GOD (There is),” he duets with Jennifer Hudson to create a distinct hip hop-gospel theological reflection, and on “Everything So Grand” he reminds us, “My trophy cases is seein’ Black faces / Smilin’ on a regular basis, where grace is,” while the beautiful voice of singer PJ croons, “You don’t gotta save the world; we can take it one day at a time.”

The Auditorium Vol. 1 reminded me of the grace and love of hip hop. May it do the same for you.