Rakim Announces Release Date For New Album

[Bones01]

Texas' massive South By Southwest Festival took over the state last week, with performances all over the place. One particular performance at Stubbs, BBQ in Austin, TX, featured the tag team of Ghostface Killah and Rakim, who both impressed the crowd with sets full of classics. Notably, Rakim announced to the crowd that he would be releasing his new album, The Seventh Seal, on 07/07/07 (a Saturday).

The album will be released independently on his own label, Ra Records, however it is still unclear if he has picked a bigger distributor to help get it on to store shelves (and make that July 7, 2007 street date). Rakim has been tight lipped about the material that will be included on the album, but a few details - which could change - have been floating around. The first single is apparently "It's Nothing", which was performed on a VH1 special, a couple of weeks back.

As far as guests go, it has been rumored that Nas will appear, but it's not definite.

"Hopefully we'll get a chance to get it in and do something special in the studio man. If it ain't special I'm not gonna try to do it," Rakim told About.Com in 2006. "If it's just a beat and he spits 16 and I spit 16 then I ain't gonna do it. But, if it's something that makes sense and it's special, then we'll do it."

Other speculation centers around whether or not the album will include tracks that Rakim recorded for the vaulted Aftermath release, Oh My God. Rumor has it that Dre allowed Rakim to keep any material that was recorded for the cancelled release, after he left the label.

[floatin_above_everything]

Props, at least we'll get one more from Ra.