If Theres a Hell Below is an amalgam of different sounds flawlessly arranged and sequenced; a fine work of artistic exactitude.

Few producers in the game have enough of the gift of rhyming to seriously toe the line between emcee and beatsmith. Some hire ghostwriters. Others simply try to make up for their lyrical deficiencies in other ways. Black Milk is the rare specimen that, especially lately, has come to know his game so well that he both emcees and produces with ease. The Detroit board hero has been honing his lyrical abilities since the beginning, and his progress is more evident with each album he drops.

If There’s a Hell Below is Black Milk’s seventh studio album. It also comes roughly a year after his sixth LP No Poison No Paradise. If There’s a Hell Below is a product of crisp, meticulous engineering. The production is, as always, an aural feast. But the ebb and flow of the album is what makes it deeply profound and loaded with replay value.

Twelve longer-than-average tracks beautifully interweave with interludes and audio samples. Lyrically Black Milk is as on point as ever. He uses a variety of flows to nudge you through first-person narratives, macabre missions of verse, and his powerful visual prose. Alongside Blu on “Leave The Bones Behind,” he goes in and holds his own: “Used to grab the pencil with money on my mental / Now I think about my kinfolk with every pen stroke / Takin’ in all the stars was our vision / The only thing that helped us get through hard livin’ / Blowin’ pot, grandpops wishin’ we would listen / Screamin’ bout how we don’t got a pot to piss in.” These rhymes showcase all three of the aforementioned writing talents, and the acrobatic flow is delivered with confidence.