It’s been about two years since we last heard from Sole, when he released his second album with DJ Pain 1, Nihilismo. Now he comes back with a self-produced solo album, Let Them Eat Sand.

If you are familiar with Sole, an album title like Let Them Eat Sand probably sounds exactly like what you’ve come to expect from the anarchist/emcee/producer. After all, this is the guy who recorded “Salt on Everything” fifteen years ago, and despite moments of promise here and there, things haven’t exactly gotten better since then. So as Sole approached fatherhood this past year, he took to producing and recording these songs to work through his anger and fear about the state of the world, the one into which this child would be entering. The music on Let Them Eat Sand isn’t any sort of radical departure from Sole’s past work – he’s been building his own niche and pissing people off for twenty years – but it is some of his rawest and most passionate work to date. The production on the album tends toward this proto-industrial sound, with distortion, keyboards, and pulsing rhythms driving a lot of the tracks, like if Suicide were updated for the indie hip hop of today. Alongside those tracks are a few slower tracks that incorporate a lo-fi, reverb-heavy guitar sound that brings in a touch of that early ‘80s indie rock sound, which pairs well with some of Sole’s more introspective lyrical moments. On the mic, Sole sticks with the delivery he shifted to in the early 2010s, giving you a clear and direct delivery with deliberate pacing to emphasize every word he’s saying. As you work your way through the album, Sole will press you on issues of environmentalism, capitalism, war, police brutality, and any other urgent matter that comes across his mind. You don’t have to agree with him one hundred percent on every issue to enjoy his music, but Sole will challenge you as a listener to think long and hard to think about where you stand on the issues that matter, and why. This isn’t an album for passive listening.

Sole has had a long and varied career, and for a lot of other artists at this point in their career, they might be showing signs of slowing down. With Let Them Eat Sand, Sole is more engaged, focused, and urgent than ever. I don’t know if this is my favorite Sole album – there are a lot to choose from – but this certainly has to be in the discussion.