Ab-Soul - Control System

The opener sets the conceptual stakes with a Jhené Aiko hook that frames enlightenment as sexual attraction, which is both clever and slightly too cute. Soul's verse describes waking up to hidden truths—government manipulation, media lies—without naming specific conspiracies yet, so the track functions as a thesis statement in broad terms. The Sounwave and Dave Free production is warm and accessible, which makes this the most radio-adjacent moment on the album. It works as an entry point but does not prepare the listener for how didactic the rest of the project will get.

The Electric Light Orchestra sample gives the track a prog-rock shimmer that makes the conspiracy talk feel more cosmic than earthbound. Soul's flow here is faster and more rhythmically varied than it will be later, which helps the track feel like momentum rather than sermon. The writing touches on predictive programming and social engineering without getting bogged down in specifics. It is one of the album's better-paced songs, though it lacks a memorable hook or a standout quotable that would make it a highlight.

This is where the album's thesis becomes explicit: Soul names the California retreat, references Skull and Bones, and describes secret societies as literal puppet masters. The Aretha Franklin and Weather Report samples create a haunted-soul backdrop that gives the paranoia a gospel weight. The verse is dense with proper nouns and historical references, which makes it rewarding for close listeners but also means the track will not reveal much on a casual pass. The beat switch in the final third adds tension, and the whole thing feels like Soul is building a case rather than writing a song. It is the purest expression of the album's conspiracy lens and one of its most musically ambitious moments.

The Bastion video game sample is an inspired choice—turning a fantasy RPG score into a meditation on state violence—and Danny Brown's verse is the album's most electrifying sixteen bars, his voice cracking and careening where Soul's stays monotone. Jhené Aiko's hook is the most conventional moment on the record, which makes the track feel like a single even though the subject matter is anything but. Soul's verse about surveillance and police aggression is more focused than his usual info-dumps, and the Jay-Z interpolation in the hook is playful without undercutting the seriousness. This is the track to play for someone who thinks Ab-Soul is all theory and no technique.

The Bo Hansson sample creates a mystic, almost medieval atmosphere for Soul's most explicitly gnostic writing: he describes the pineal gland as the seat of spiritual vision and frames fluoride in the water supply as a deliberate calcification. The verse is instructional, almost pedagogical, and the lack of a hook or guest vocal makes it feel like a lecture. It works within the album's conceptual arc but it is also the moment where the didacticism tips into self-seriousness. Listeners who are already skeptical of the conspiracy framework will check out here; believers will treat it as scripture.

The King Crimson sample is the album's most adventurous production choice, all prog-rock dissonance and polyrhythmic unease, and it underscores Soul's critique of hypocrisy—moral, political, sexual. Anna Wise's vocals add a melodic counterpoint that keeps the track from feeling too cerebral. The writing is sharper here than on the previous few songs, with specific images of relationship dysfunction standing in for broader institutional contradictions. It is one of the album's better integrations of the personal and the conceptual, though it does not hit as hard as the grief-focused tracks later.

This is the first moment where the conspiracy talk recedes and the album begins to turn inward. The King Blue production is looser and more soulful than the TaeBeast beats, and Soul's verse touches on self-doubt and emotional confusion without the usual rhetorical armor. It is a transitional track, not a highlight, but it signals that the second half will be less about institutions and more about the self. The pacing here is slightly too slow and the hook is too minimal to carry the track, so it functions more as an interlude than a full song.

The title references the Stop Online Piracy Act, and the Nez & Rio production flips the legislative acronym into a broader metaphor for control and censorship. Schoolboy Q's verse is solid but forgettable, delivering the kind of tough talk that does not deepen the concept. Soul's writing here is more polemical than poetic, and the track feels like a think piece set to drums. It works as a thesis statement about internet freedom, but it does not add much to the album's emotional or musical arc. The beat is crisp and the sequencing makes sense, but this is one of the few tracks that could have been cut without weakening the whole.

The Isaac Hayes sample gives the track a cinematic soul-funk foundation, and the concept—desire as demonic possession—is the kind of paranoid metaphor that the album does best. Jay Rock's verse adds street credibility without much thematic depth, and BJ the Chicago Kid's hook is smooth enough to make the track feel more accessible than it is. Soul's writing frames sex as a distraction engineered to keep people from enlightenment, which is both on-brand and slightly exhausting. It is a solid mid-album track, not essential but not filler either.

The Madonna sample interpolated with Kendrick's ADHD is a sharp conceptual move, framing distraction as a weapon and enlightenment as the antidote. Kendrick's verse is technically superior to anything else on the album, his multisyllabic rhyme schemes and internal rhythms making Soul's flow sound more pedestrian by comparison. The chemistry between the two is real—they are clearly pushing each other conceptually even if Kendrick is the better technician—and the track is one of the album's few moments where the conspiracy talk feels genuinely collaborative rather than solo sermon. It is a highlight both for the production and for the rare instance of Soul sounding energized rather than resigned.

Alori Joh's vocals give the track an intimacy that the rest of the album has avoided, and the Midnight Star and Paul Simon samples create a warmer, more nostalgic backdrop. Soul's verse is about love as resistance and partnership as rebellion against a system designed to isolate, which retroactively becomes unbearably sad given Joh's death. The writing here is less dense, more plainspoken, and the emotional stakes are clearer than on any previous track. It is the first moment where the album stops arguing and starts confessing, and it sets up the emotional devastation of the final three songs.

The Ahmad Jamal loop is the album's jazziest moment, and Soul's verse is a straightforward expression of gratitude to his crew, his city, and his late partner. There is no conspiracy talk here, just a catalog of relationships and influences. It works as a breather after the intensity of the previous tracks, and it humanizes Soul in a way the didactic material does not. The writing is simpler, almost conversational, and the track feels like an exhale. It is not a highlight but it is necessary pacing, and the Willie B production is warm enough to carry the sentiment.

This is the first track recorded after Alori Joh's death, and it is devastating in its plainness. Joh's vocals are present, JaVonté adds a mournful hook, and Soul's verse is a direct address to her, asking why she left and confessing that he does not know how to process the loss. The Skhye Hutch production is spare, almost skeletal, and the whole track feels like a wound that has not yet scarred. It is the emotional climax of the album, the moment where all the conspiracy talk is revealed as a way of imposing order on a world that has become unbearable. The writing here is the least clever and the most honest Soul has been on the record, and it is more powerful for it.

At two and a half minutes, this feels like a sketch rather than a fully realized song. The Kanye West interpolation nods to Addiction, and Soul's verse touches on substance use and emotional numbness, but the track does not develop either idea enough to stand on its own. It works as a transitional moment between the raw grief of Empathy and the controlled devastation of the tracks that follow, but it is the one moment on the album that feels undercooked.

The OutKast sample sets a morbid, reflective tone, and the guest verses from Punch and Ashtrobot add voices without disrupting the mood. Soul's verse frames death as transformation, not ending, which is both a philosophical claim and a way of processing Joh's suicide. The writing is less direct than on Empathy, more metaphorical, and the track functions as a way of stepping back from the raw emotion to consider what the loss means. It is not as powerful as the tracks immediately before and after it, but it serves the album's arc by giving the grief a conceptual framework.

The closing track is the album's most complete statement: a verse that moves from childhood trauma to failed relationships to Alori Joh's pregnancy and suicide, all over a Tommy Black beat that loops Ahmad Jamal and Bobby McFerrin into something that sounds like a jazz funeral. Soul's writing here is the most narrative and the most vulnerable on the record, describing Joh's death in specific, unbearable detail and confessing that he does not know how to move forward. The verse ends with the revelation that she was pregnant when she died, which reframes the entire album as a tribute to two lives lost. It is one of the most emotionally direct closing tracks in rap, and it justifies every conspiracy digression that came before it by showing that the paranoia was also a way of avoiding this pain. The track does not offer resolution, just the fact of the loss and the commitment to keep going.

The bonus track is a Black Hippy posse cut that breaks the album's emotional arc and feels tacked on. The Donny Hathaway sample is beautiful, and the verses from Jay Rock, Kendrick, and Schoolboy Q are all solid cypher material, but the track has nothing to do with the conceptual or emotional journey that preceded it. It works as a reminder that Ab-Soul is part of a crew, but sequenced after The Book of Soul it feels like an afterthought rather than a statement. Still, the rapping is strong enough that the track justifies its inclusion as a bonus, even if it weakens the album's sense of closure.