My Gut Reaction: Big Daddy Kane - It's A Big Daddy Thing (1989)

Back when I first wrote about Big Daddy Kane's debut, Long Live The Kane, I had mentioned that I never listened to any of Kane's work up until that point, and was pleasantly surprised by what I found. So, of course, the next logical step is to follow the discography, and that's where My Gut Reaction to It's A Big Daddy Thing, Kane's sophomore effort, comes in.

Released one year after his debut, It's A Big Daddy Thing is apparently Kane's best-selling album in his entire catalog. It features a couple of songs that hit the Top 40 charts, and the disc's success helped him ease into the new decade. Big Daddy Kane's verse on Marley Marl's "The Symphony" (alongside other fellow Juice Crew members Master Ace, Craig G., and Kool G. Rap), released after Long Live The Kane hit shelves, probably did the most to stir up interest in the project, though, being that "The Symphony" is generally considered to be the best hip hop posse cut in history.

Let's hope this is worth my time.

1. IT'S A BIG DADDY THING
The beat sounded like it was going to rock, until Kane started rapping: after that, the instrumental switched itself up to a lame-ass club-ready track. And this is a fucking Prince Paul beat! (I'm as shocked as you are right now.) On the upside, the beat sounds as if Paul specifically created it for Kane to use, but that's not much of a positive. This does not bode well.

2. ANOTHER VICTORY
Easy Mo Bee's beat kind of sounds like a De La Soul reject, but Kane flows over it like water. Although it still isn't as catchy as the best songs from Long Live The Kane, this is still not half bad.

3. MORTAL COMBAT
Kane sounds as if he's about to trip over his words, and his own instrumental (Kane actually produced the majority of the album himself) manages to be both derivative and too busy, an interesting combination, but not nearly intriguing enough for me to give a damn.

4. CHILDREN R THE FUTURE
I liked the sentiment, but Whitney Houston did it better, and I hate nearly every single Whitney Houston song there is. (There's a song she did with Wyclef a bit more recently, "My Love Is Your Love", which is good, but I'm veering off topic.) I'm not saying that all rappers have to rhyme about killing people and having promiscuous sex all the fucking time, but I'm pretty sure that Kane doesn't perform this at his live shows. (Maybe I'm wrong, though.) Also, was it really necessary to misspell the word "are"? If children r the future, maybe they should be taught how to spell.

5. YOUNG, GIFTED, AND BLACK
I have to be honest. Kane sounds great over this Marley Marl beat, but I feel that Jay-Z sounded better when he jacked the instrumental, an opinion I attribute to the fact that I had heard this song last. However, the best use of this instrumental has to be Breezly Brewin' and Big Sha's "What U Got (The Demo)" from Prince Paul's A Prince Among Thieves. I'm fairly certain I'm in the minority, though.

6. SMOOTH OPERATOR
I couldn't get into this at all.

7. CALLING MR. WELFARE
Social commentary in a rap song is usually something that I appreciate and support, but this song doesn't sound sincere: all Kane does is criticize without offering any constructive feedback. The introduction also sounds pretty fucking insipid. Oh well.

8. WRATH OF KANE (LIVE)
Kane sounds pretty good live. I bet it was pretty fucking amazing to see all of these artists live in concert back in the day, as opposed to watching what passed for a hip hop show today. As for why there isn't simply a studio version of this song on here, I'll never know.

9. I GET THE JOB DONE
Meh.

10. AIN'T NO STOPPIN' US NOW
Nothing on here is grabbing me like his debut did. I don't expect greatness, but it would be nice if the music were interesting. The sad thing is, this is the other Prince Paul-produced track on It's A Big Daddy Thing, and I don't like it at all. This shit is just depressing.

11. PIMPIN' AIN'T EASY (FEAT ANT LIVE, NICE & SMOOTH, & SCOOB LOVER)
It certainly isn't. It's fucking hilarious that this song appears on the same album as "Children R The Future", especially with Kane's ridiculously and unnecessarily homophobic verse. Not like you'll ever hear his anti-gay comments anyway, since this song is so awful, but whatever.

12. BIG DADDY'S THEME
Not the best instrumental in the world, but I've heard worse, so kudos to Kane. His joke at the end isn't really very funny, though.

13. TO BE YOUR MAN (FEAT BLUE MAGIC & CHUCK STANLEY)
I can't imagine that this song was a good idea back in 1989, as it's clearly terrible today. A message to all aspiring rappers that read this blog: love songs don't have to completely suck.

14. THE HOUSE THAT CEE BUILT
The deejay cut that we don't see as much of anymore, because rappers only seem to use deejays on their mixtapes. Not bad.

15. ON THE MOVE
Fuck, this album is boring. How is it possible that this is the biggest seller in Kane's career?

16. WARM IT UP, KANE
Okay, I finally found something that offsets my last comment. This song is just plain great. Kane effortlessly flows over his own beat, presenting us with the album's pinnacle moment.

17. RAP SUMMARY (LEAN ON ME) (REMIX)
Hearing Kane rhyme from the perspective of Morgan Freeman's Joe Clark from (predictably) Lean On Me. I suppose Freeman is a good choice, since Kane could have easily rhymed as Jim Belushi's Rick Latimer (from The Principal) when it came to choosing the mindset of an annoyed administrator. Regardless, this song is a mess, kind of embarrassing to listen to, and I fucking hate the Bill Withers song anyway, so I'm just through with this shit.

THE LAST WORD: As much as I recommended Long Live The Kane, I can honestly say that I will never listen to It's A Big Daddy Thing again. This album is consistently boring, with only one or two highlights that managed to keep me awake. It seems that Kane got lazy after his early success and felt that putting his name on anything would help it sell, regardless of quality, and to that end, he was right. If this were his debut album, we would have never heard from the man again.

That is all. Comments can be left below.

-Max

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Big Daddy Kane - Long Live The Kane (My Gut Reaction)