Public Enemy’s Black Sky Over The Projects: Apartment 2025 arrives with no fanfare, no rollout, no radio push—just a surprise drop on Bandcamp under their own Flavor Flav Records imprint. That approach fits the tone of the album: unfiltered, urgent, and grounded in the same core convictions Chuck D and Flavor Flav have carried for decades. This isn’t It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back or Fear of a Black Planet, but no one with sense expects it to be. That era is locked in history. What this is, though, is a hard-hitting, tightly built record that proves Public Enemy remains one of the most vital forces Hip Hop has ever produced.
Chuck D sounds locked in from the start. His voice cuts through on “Siick,” which opens with serrated guitar riffs and a dense rhythm section that leans into rap rock without falling into cliché. The beat, produced by longtime collaborator C-Doc, stays compact and loud. Chuck moves through the track with control, calling out political dysfunction, media decay, and the weight of trying to stay grounded in a country that runs on crisis.
“Confusion (Here Come the Drums)” follows with Flav jumping in to trade bars. The chemistry is still there. Flav brings chaos, Chuck brings structure. The beat is rough-edged and full of layers: live-sounding drums, chopped samples, scratch flourishes. They keep a tight rhythm while flipping bars about the loss of discipline in Hip Hop and the power of sticking around long enough to see the cycles repeat.
“What Eye Said” picks up speed with a throwback energy. Chuck throws down a challenge to anyone still writing rhymes, pointing out how much weight language can carry when you don’t fall back on easy outs. There’s a sharp clarity to his voice here—less rage, more control. The production is thick with chopped loops, bursts of static, and low-end pressure.
“Cmon Get Down” moves toward a funkier swing. Flav is fully in his element here, off-kilter and bouncing from line to line. He’s not trying to make sense—he’s trying to rattle the structure. The track uses a rubbery bassline, cut-up horns, and drums that land with a cracked snare sound. It keeps things unpredictable without losing grip.
On “Evil Way,” Chuck takes the production reins himself. This one leans heavy into rock textures—layered guitars, crashing cymbals, thick midrange distortion. He stays on message, driving into themes of corruption and personal collapse with a calm intensity. “Sexegenarian” pulls things in a different direction: slower tempo, soul samples worked into the background, and a narrative voice. Chuck isn’t reminiscing—he’s building a direct line to people decades younger, laying out the strain of aging in a culture that erases anything past its peak hype.
“Messy Hens” gives Flav his first solo track on the album. It’s all sneer and energy, structured around a sparse beat with a lot of space between the kicks and snares. His flow is loose and jagged, leaning more on rhythm than rhyme. He’s talking about distractions, clout-chasers, and not wasting time on things that don’t stick. “Fools Fools Fools (Dirty Drums Mixx)” tightens things again with live drums courtesy of Tré Cool of Green Day. It’s one of the cleanest mixes on the album. Chuck moves through it like a veteran quarterback—reading, timing, striking. The focus here is on fake profiles, digital lies, and how social currency replaced real conversation.
“Public Enemy Comin Throoooo” hits harder than the title suggests. Flav drops in with high energy, hyping their longevity without sounding like a nostalgia act. Chuck answers with surgical verses that stack decades of cultural commentary into tightly wound bars. They aren’t trying to convince anyone of their place—they’re stating it plainly.
“Ageism” continues a thread Chuck started on Radio Armageddon earlier this year. The production leans on a looped funk groove with a rough finish. He’s talking about staying present while the industry cycles out anything that doesn’t feed short-term metrics. The words hit clean. The beat stays tight.
“The Hits Just Keep on Comin’” brings Chuck and Flav back together again. The drums are front-loaded, with distortion buried in the mix. They trade lines about political fatigue, social violence, and media gaslighting. There’s an urgency here, but it’s not out of control. They’ve lived long enough in this system to know how deep it runs.
The album closes on “March Madness,” a Flav-led track that targets gun violence and government fraud. It doesn’t follow a clean verse-chorus pattern. It jumps from chant to breakdown to rant, pulled together by a distorted loop and staggered percussion. Flav’s delivery is ragged, agitated, and loud. It fits the subject matter. The tension never gets resolved—the track ends in static.
Musically, Black Sky Over The Projects: Apartment 2025 is dense and layered without sounding bloated. The production—handled by C-Doc, DJ MROK, Felony Muzik, Carl Ryder, and others—leans into grit and analog textures. There’s plenty of distortion, tape hiss, and irregular breaks, but it never slides off the rails. Even the more chaotic moments have control behind them. Every verse has a place. Every bar hits something real.
Chuck D’s voice remains one of the most commanding in Hip Hop. He doesn’t shout. He doesn’t bend words for attention. He speaks with a full chest, each line landing with force. Flav is still unpredictable. Still loud, erratic, and unruly in the best way. Together, they keep balance: chaos and precision, rhythm and rupture.
This isn’t like one of their early classics. No album is. It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back and Fear of a Black Planet are timeless and untouchable. Black Sky Over The Projects doesn’t need to match that. It adds to a long legacy without repeating it. Public Enemy is still active, still locked into the moment, and still making Hip Hop that sounds like it has something urgent to say.
This is a strong album. It’s clear, driven, and tightly structured. It proves that Public Enemy remains the greatest Hip Hop group of all time—not by leaning on their past, but by staying present and direct in every bar they deliver.
8/10
Download: Black Sky Over The Projects: Apartment 2025
Also read: The Best Hip Hop Albums Of 2025