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Still, it’s a long way from Mos Def and Talib Kweli Are Black Star. Stark yet sophisticated, that disc became the Raw and the Cooked of today’s underground hip-hop, throwing gasoline on the embers of a dormant subculture. The Beautiful Struggle dampens those embers by trying to spread them into a bigger pit.

Mos Def, meanwhile, doesn’t even bother with the fire, instead dousing gas on his own image and lighting a fresh match. The inclination to immolate his image speaks to his love of acting (he’s got serious film, Broadway, and TV credits) and also to his smoldering ambition. As a musician, he’s never been more impressive, being steeped in the blues and all its offshoots so hard, he almost succeeds in regathering the African Diaspora on one disc, claiming punk rock, metal, hip-hop, jazz, Marvin Gaye, and even Hair as his own. But his attitude has never been so offputting, as he projects personas that are suspicious, boastful, disdainful, and self-interested. Often, Mos Def even chucks his deft raps for hollow chants and slovenly mumblings: "I’ll be your boogie man," "I am that nigger," "My whole life is real," whatever.

In short, he’s acting the part of that Nigga Ya Love To Hate, Part 37 Million. If you think the focus is misplaced at this historical juncture, well, that might make Mos Def’s blackface even more bracing than it would be if you agreed with his reductionism. Mos’s effrontery jolts your perspective, engaging your entire brain like all the most daring art. This isn’t to excuse his ugly prejudices, which probably reach their lowest point on "The Rape Over," a rewrite of Jay-Z’s "The Takeover" that blasts every non-hip-hop entity "running this rap shit," including "quasi-homosexuals." But give credit to his instinct to let his band, Black Jack Johnson, jam away while he’s venting his subconscious like John Lennon fronting the Plastic Ono Band, because the Plastic Ono Band weren’t one fifth as funky as P-Funk’s Bernie Worrell (keys), Living Coloür’s Will Calhoun (drums), and especially the Bad Brains’ Gary Miller (a/k/a Dr. Know), who — finally — makes this hip-hop’s first good punk guitar album.

The price of this blackface — what’s being lost for the sake of bad-ass cred — can be heard on two new albums on the upstart Illson Media label. Medina Green’s U-Know the Flex: The Mix Tape Vol-01 mostly features Mos Def’s younger brother, DCQ (a/k/a Jashiya Illson), in decent, darkly tinged underground tough talk. But one track, "Beef," features Mos Def himself front and center, setting geopolitical horror, personal tragedy, and street-corner bluster in proper proportion with the sharpest rap since his 1999 solo debut. And UTD’s Manifest Destiny is better yet, an unreleased gem from 1996 that features Mos Def, DCQ, and their friend Ces, a female rapper who cut her teeth on MC Lyte. Not that she totally bites Lyte’s style, because this trio nibble at every worthy style of hip-hop’s golden age, especially the trippy lilt of the Native Tongues crews. As they bluff their way past thugs and blow through Brooklyn at midnight, they earn the right to their album title, which is reminiscent of a time when rap still didn’t know the meaning of back rent.

Some critics have claimed the same for De La Soul’s "If It Wasn’t for You," on production team Handsome Boy Modeling School’s fun, funny, and occasionally wonderful spoof White People (Atlantic/Elektra). Reuniting the trio with their great early producer, Prince Paul, the track is playful and goofy and unpredictably clever like the crew’s best classic tracks. Yet it doesn’t compare with The Grind Date, which De La Soul acknowledge is simply their attempt to get back on their feet and get by "thought free," as De La’s Dave puts it in a press release. If Talib Kweli is trying to buy his way into mainstream legitimacy and Mos Def is trying to buy every stereotype of black rebellion, De La Soul are going full circle and remembering Q-Tip’s line in ’89: "Black is black is black is black." So as on their two Art Official Intelligence masterpieces, only without the heightened ambition, they nestle again into the bosom of soul and funk that most mainstream hip-hop only skims, trading their youthful playfulness for an adult day job as reliable black entertainers.

The lead single, "Shopping Bags," is about gold diggers, for Christ’s sake, but man, does it hit on the one. Every cut is dense with thumping beats, incessant soul samples, and rhymes that bear fruit as you instinctively reach for replay to hear that hook one more time. Highlights include a guest appearance by Ghostface, the Motowny "No," and "Church," which is about replacing "rebellion with rebirth" and coping in a world that almost never goes the way of our dreams. Its opening line: "Wake up!"