White bands covering R&B songs can be pretty dodgy given, you know, that whole history of rock ‘n’ roll being a story of theft thing. Beyond that, the chutzpah it takes for anybody to tackle Marvin Gaye is kinda flabbergasting: You really think you can do justice to a song off one of the most profound albums of the past 50 years? Black Lung and MC Eze Jackson not only rise to that challenge but knock it out of the park. The hair-parting power trio finds the Sabbath-like groove in Gaye’s plangent soul funk, while Jackson not only finds a tense flow to compliment the oomph, but manages to write a new verse—pick jaw off floor here—that turns this late-’60s entreaty into a primal scream for today’s Baltimore.
