Deep-Fried, Honey-Dipped

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Is there a more potent cultural trope than a Southern accent? Just a few long vowels, and much of the rest of America is swept up by mystique, fascinated by the ancient hurt we imagine lurking behind the lips of the speaker.

Southerners know this, and they use it to great effect. Rappers are no exception. Nappy Roots, a six-man crew from Bowling Green, Ky., is the latest to make being from the South not just a fact in its bio but an agenda. To be fair, its major-label debut, Watermelon, Chicken & Gritz (last week's biggest gainer on the Billboard Top 200 chart), shows none of the crass preoccupation with pimping and cash that dominates rap from the coasts. On the laid-back Po' Folks, the guys rhyme through thick drawls, "All my life been po'/But it really don't matter no mo'/And they wonder why we act this way/Nappy Roots gonna be O.K." The message is that Nappy Roots' members are happy being who they are--maybe a little too happy. Those drawls are awfully thick, and heaps of food references threaten to turn the album into a lyrical steam table. Given that Bowling Green is closer to Ohio than Mississippi, it's worth wondering if some of these Nappy Roots aren't dyed.

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A less deep-fried album is served up by Cee-lo (Thomas Callaway), a member of the pioneering Atlanta rap quartet Goodie MOb. Cee-lo doesn't bother with Southern totems on his superb solo debut, Cee-lo Green and His Perfect Imperfections. He lets his individuality, not his geography, do the talking. On Big Ole Words (Damn) Cee-lo rhymes, "I have millenniums of material and rivers of rhythm/An entire ocean of emotion that's enlightened to swim in." Cee-lo sounds a lot like Al Green, and so do his songs, full of complicated themes, big grooves and deep, honey-dipped soul. Even when he seems to be singing about, well, poultry, as on the supremely funky El Dorado Sunrise (Super Chicken), it feels vaguely religious. As a producer, Cee-lo orchestrates a humid symphony of rap, rock, gospel, horns and African rhythms to go with his wordplay. No album in recent memory--Yankee or Dixie--has taken so much joy in simply making music.