A Reader's Gut Reaction: Canibus & Keith Murray - The Undergods (EP) (September 29, 2009)

(I had completely forgotten about this project. Today's Reader Review finds longtime contributor Dag Diligent tackling the Keith Murray and Canibus collaboration The Undergods, an EP which is exclusively available as an mp3 download only at this time, exactly one year after it first hit the Interweb. Be sure to leave some comments below.)


On the surface, Keith Murray and Canibus seem like a good combination, and not just because they first worked together on “Some Shit” from Murray's It's A Beautiful Thing. They have surprisingly similar backgrounds: both are both mid-level East Coast hip hop veterans who peaked in popularity over a decade ago. They are also somewhat cerebral emcees who sometimes delightfully confuse facts and spit nonsense because they can. Both men experienced early success and then watched their careers slide into oblivion. They have each made so many weak and reckless comeback attempts that they have virtually guaranteed that no one will check for their work, except for bloggers looking for an easy target. Like me.


But as a long-time hip hop head who bought Murray’s The Most Beautifullest Thing in This World in 1994, and followed the Canibus / LL Cool J battle as it played out on Hot 97, I can assure you that these two emcees are highly unbalanced and have a lot of baggage to overcome to create anything worth listening to. (Actually, all they need is just one good song, but somehow I don’t see it happening, as their potential for a comeback is that low.)


I mentioned that these two are quite an unbalanced team, and here’s why: Keith Murray is a genuine emcee while Canibus is a novelty act. Murray came up under the wing of Erick Sermon, earning his rep by dropping two decent albums The Most Beautifullest Thing In This World and Enigma. He has a disarming and engaging style that works well, balancing out the Def Squad trio by providing the middle ground between the boisterous Redman and the lethargic Erick Sermon. He is also one of the few emcees who actually sounds good over an Erick Sermon beat. His career was eventually disrupted by his anger issues, a prison sentence for assaulting a record label employee, and later on, his inability to secure decent beats.


Canibus, on the other hand, is a technically astute emcee who can pull together imaginative rhymes, but has absolutely no charisma. Everything about him seems gimmicky: his name is a bad pun, he always sounds “drama-school” angry, he seems to literally spits into the mic when he raps, some of his word choices make me cringe, and his college vocabulary is forced into every pretentious rhyme. He received enormous attention for rap-battling LL Cool J over some bullshit line about a tattoo on the song “4,3,2,1”, which led to a lot of radio play and a solo album. I know it’s unlikely, but I’ve always believed that his LL battle was somehow engineered by the record labels to (1) boost the sales of LL’s garbage album Phenomenon and (2) strongly introduce the next rap messiah, Canibus. The hype for Canibus was thick, but his debut album Can-I-Bus never came close to living up to expectations, so his career has been in the toilet ever since (except maybe for his stint in the Army, where at least he briefly pulled a regular paycheck). Oh, and his beats are always terrible.


The Undergods EP appears to be doomed. It features two has-been emcees who have never pulled good beats. Canibus is one of the two emcees. The other, Keith Murray, is actually very good friends with the sworn enemy of Canibus, LL Cool J. (Must have made for some awkward lunch breaks.) And the reviewer is biased (but at least respects Murray).


But at least the album contains only seven tracks.


1. ONE TWENTY NINE
You’ll know that Erick Sermon produced this beat within the first few seconds, as it follows his standard clean and boring approach. But the Chuck D. sample works well for a hook and adds some energy, especially within the song's boxing context. (It turns out that E. Serm produced about half the album, or to be more specific, the worst half.) Keith Murray sounds right at home on E's beat and almost reminds me of his Def Squad days. Canibus, on the other hand, is grating as usual.


2. SHOW 'EM WHAT CRAZY IS (FEAT TECH N9NE)
The track begins with our friends calling themselves the Burnout Brothers, which is apparently their alternate group name. Which is a terrible idea, since Canibus insultingly calls his wack peers “sellout emcees with burned out skills” just two songs later. The beat is bad, and Murray’s voice is terrible on the chorus, too. Special guest star Tech N9ne is actually the worst of the three. Fuck.


3. NO BRAINER
The beat is overly busy, but it starts to bang once it gets going. Keith Murray rocks it perfectly, which just goes to show that, with improved production, Mr. Murray could still be a relevant player in the game. Canibus sounds rushed, but he earns his keep on this here (except for on his line, “How many hands am I holding up man? Four. I only got 2”). This is definitely the best that the Undergods have to offer.


4. GOTTA BE REAL
This brand of sappy-smooth instrumental appears to be mandatory on the comeback albums of veteran emcees; on here, the style is solidly stuck in the mode of "Do G's Get To Go To Heaven?" by Richie Rich, which is never a good thing. Unsurprisingly, Erick Sermon is behind the boards, and he does his best to kill the track dead with a Hall & Oates bass line and a stock R&B hook. The Undergods sound just fine, but with this kind of beat, they never had a chance.


5. STOP FRONTIN'
If there's one thing you can expect from a rap artist, it's a song about fronting, or more specifically, the cessation thereof. Keith Murray handles the chorus fairly well over another uninteresting beat by the Green Eyed Bandit.


6. RISE OF THE MACHINE
Ah! The Keith Murray and Canibus that we all know and love stop by to give us exactly what we were expecting this entire time: an unbearable song. The boys found a producer worse than E. Serm in David "Gordo" Strickland, who also holds the honor of helping fuck up tracks for Method Man and Redman. It isn't humanly possible to rhyme hard enough to save yourself from this beat swallowing you whole. The hook in mind-numbingly bad, but you'll be hard pressed to make it that far with an instrumental this irritating. Also, I don’t know where Canibus comes up with his lines, but shit, they are awkward: “Your fingers smell like nicotine / before you touch the controls wash your hands clean / a human being with dreams that can only be seen by a machine with a L- RAD screen”.


7. DIE BIG TIME (SHOW & PROVE) (FEAT CROOKED I)
Erick Sermon fumbles the whole "Burnout Brothers" concept by calling the boys the Smokeout Brothers right from the jump. The Bob Marley sample really slows down the track, but the beat was pretty lifeless to begin with, as it has more samples than a Sam’s Club on a Saturday. All the emcees get lost in the beat. Oh, and they added a Carlito's Way sound bite to the track just to make sure you remember that this duo peaked in the 1990s. (Think Pain In Da Ass from those early Jay-Z albums.)


THE LAST WORD: Avoid this shit. The lyrics on The Undergods are solid enough, especially if you're still a fan of Canibus, and overall this is a step up from the recent output from both emcees. But this album packs a wicked follow-up punch: you also have to be a fan of Erick Sermon’s recent production work to actually enjoy it. I’m no fan of Canibus, and while I respect Erick Sermon, his production can best be described as tired. He is a one trick pony, and I saw the trick way back in the 1990’s. So the only good thing about The Undergods is Mr. Keith Murray, and while he spits exactly as one would expect, he is clearly weighed down by his alliances. Pass on this one, except maybe for the track “No Brainer”.


-Dag Diligent


(Questions? Comments? Hate mail for what amounted to yet another critique of Canibus and his loss of relevancy in our chosen genre? Leave your thoughts below.)

Kool Keith - Black Elvis / Lost In Space (August 10, 1999)

In 1999, "Kool" Keith Thornton had planned on releasing two projects on the same date.  One of them was an over-the-top serial killer fantasy project from a newly-conceived alias, Dr. Dooom, which was to be distributed by an independent label overseen by longtime collaborator Kutmasta Kurt.  The other was a tad bit more experimental, though: Keith had managed to sign a contract with one of the major labels (Ruffhouse/Columbia, home of Nas, Cypress Hill, and the Fugees), and was going to self-produce (for the very first time) and release the elaborately-named Black Elvis / Lost In Space, because why the hell not, right?


Unfortunately, major label interference got in the way, pushing the release date back by a few months, resulting in Kool Keith appearing to be merely prolific and not also schizophrenic.  Although Keith would probably have welcomed the negative attention regardless: this is the same guy who made up a false history of being a patient in Bellevue when he thought that a reporter wasn't paying attention to a word he was saying, and instead of disputing it immediately, he embraced the lie.  (He also thanks his "evil twin brother" Dr. Dooom in the liner notes of Black Elvis / Lost In Space.)


Perhaps assuming that Kool Keith's fans weren't exactly legion or anything, the marketing department at Ruffhouse paid zero attention to the project; aside from shooting one video (which barely got any airplay on MTV) and producing a couple of print ads, it was up to Keith to promote the album.  And he clearly noticed: upset with the entire process, he even recorded a couple of songs venting his frustration.  One of them, "Release Date", even somehow made it onto early copies of Black Elvis / Lost In Space as the lead-off track: it's obvious that almost nobody was paying any attention at the label, except for the guy that had it removed from the final cut.


Unsurprisingly, Black Elvis / Lost In Space sold almost zero copies.  Also unsurprisingly, Kool Keith walked away from his major label contract, retreating back into the land of independence, where at least he could release his many albums on his own schedule, and with as many labels as he saw fit.


I say "almost zero copies" because I honestly feel that I own one of the only discs that Keith was able to sell, thanks to some extremely poor distribution.  (Even Dr. Dooom's First Come, First Served ended up in chain stores such as Best Buy and the now-defunct Circuit City: I had to go out of my way to find a project from a fucking major label at a mom and pop shop.)  But the liner notes from Black Elvis / Lost In Space (which, yes, features Kool Keith wearing an Elvis wig because he can) are pure gold.  In addition to containing a flyer to order Keith merchandise such as hoodies, t-shirts, Black Elvis wigs, temporary tattoos, action figures, and yo-yos (I'm almost certain that none of that shit ever existed in the first place, but I'm still tempted to see what a Kool Keith skateboard (also available) looks like), our host burns several bridges in an insane manner.  For instance, he takes the record label Tuff City to task for lying about receiving authorization from Keith to release his music, he calls out anonymous rappers who stole all of his concepts (such as wearing masks, wigs, and capes; referring to themselves as a "doctor" and coming up with multiple personalities; and so forth), he trashes his former apprentice Sir Menelik (who appeared on Dr. Octagonecologyst), and he thanks his own former crew, the Ultramagnetic MC's, and "their imaginary comeback album" (which eventually happened, although not in the form most of us would have preferred). 


He also thanks, in a non-backhanded manner, his own aliases (if you'll recall, he has a shitload of them; he could probably populate a planet with all of his fucking personas), college radio, his manager, a bunch of porn stars, his "celebrity fans" such as Donald Trump, Jerry Seinfeld, and Monica Lewinsky, and then takes the time to name-drop a bunch of rappers that he actually likes, such as Master P, C-Murder, and Mia X (apparently, Kool Keith loved the No Limit Records empire at this time), Do or Die, 2Pac, The Notorious B.I.G., Puff Daddy (the fuck?), The Prodigy (not really that surprising), Madonna, James Brown, Prince Paul, and Brotha Lynch Hung.  So, once again, the dude is clearly out there, as if the album's title didn't tip you off.


Yeah, I think I've filled enough space for a write-up that will receive approximately five comments anyway.


1. INTRO (FEAT BLACK SILVER THE NAVIGATOR & PIZ 'N RIZ)
Keith aims a ton of rhetorical questions (some of which are quite funny) at nobody at particular before kicking a quick verse. This rap album intro was nonsensical (it ends with somebody else's disembodied voice tasking our host with not being branded as an outright hater), but then again, so is Kool Keith.


2. LOST IN SPACE (FEAT BLACK SILVER THE NAVIGATOR)
Hilariously, Black Elvis / Lost In Space reverses its very own titular implications, so the Lost In Space program plays out first. Keith's production has never been as clean and concise as it is on this album: this could be a result of major label meddling, which means that, maybe, the majors aren't all evil overlords wreaking havoc on their talented employees. (Who knew?) Keith spits out gibberish space terms in an attempt to sound intelligent, which he admittedly is, but he ends up sounding obtuse, and the hook (performed by Black Silver, Keith's coworker in the Analog Brothers and also one of the major musicians behind the scenes on this project) sucks. But fuck it, the beat sounded pretty goddamn good.


3. ROCKETS ON THE BATTLEFIELD
Here's an example of how Keith's unfiltered thoughts can result in a muddled mess. Thornton's beat is flat-out awesome: the man has created a masterful post-apocalyptic walk in Central Park, as you look around at the destruction in the hope that you'll chance upon other survivors so that your loneliness won't become more deafening than it already is. Keith's rhymes are even atypically clear. However, he's loaded the instrumental with agonizing sound effects, terrible ad-libs, and a hook that consists only of repetition of the song's title, which is apropos to nothing. What a waste.


4. LIVIN' ASTRO
Aside from the fact that Keith isn't talking about serial killing, this would have fit in better on Dr. Dooom's First Come, First Served (if it wasn't called “Livin' Astro”, anyway). Keith is at his most appealing on here, linking non-sequiturs together with the aid of a fast-paced, punchy beat that is among the man's very best creations. The lone video commissioned for the project was for this very song, but I've never actually watched it. “Livin' Astro” is one of the best solo tracks Keith Thornton has done and will ever do. There, I said it.


5. SUPERGALACTIC LOVER
And then he presents listeners with this shit. Okay, that last sentence was a bit harsh. This song isn't completely horrible: in fact, for one of Keith's trademarked soliloquies aimed at the female audience that simply does not exist for our host, this isn't terrible. But the hook kills the mood, as Kool Keith has paid some tone-deaf production assistant to coo the song's title in an effort to be cute. While the image of a “monkey-green rag-top Seville” is kind of goofy, this track is a bore.


6. MASTER OF THE GAME (FEAT ROGER TROUTMAN)
To my knowledge, this was Roger Troutman's last recorded appearance: shortly after his performance, he was killed by his own brother as part of some sort of financial dispute or something (his brother later turned the gun on himself). The founding father of the Auto-Tune movement as we know it is  (although Roger's vocal distorter of choice was the Talkbox) is represented in a very respectful manner, and in some strange sort of homage, Keith spits double-time over a bounce track and does so impressively. Roger is better known to younger hip hop heads as “the guy who sang the hook on 2Pac's 'California Love'”, but this ends up just as good of a tribute to the late lead singer of Zapp.


7. I'M SEEIN' ROBOTS
Keith begins this track with an abnormally acute observation: all of the electronic gadgets people carry everywhere are slowly turning us all into robots. (Technically, he's referring to “voicemail” and “pagers” as examples of what robots carry, but this song is from 1999: eleven years on, we've only gotten worse.) Which makes the half-thought-out chorus absolutely hilarious, as Keith gives up on a simply repeating the title and instead sings “La la la la la la”. However, the verses themselves fail to explore this theme any further: we are subjected to a typical harsh verbal beatdown, one that listeners should skip entirely.


8. STATIC (FEAT SADAT X)
As the man lives in a fantasy world in which the only other hip hop artists around are Motion Man, Ice-T, and his various shitty weed carriers, seeing Kool Keith acknowledge that other rappers actually exist is an event in and of itself. Being from the old school (lest we forget the man's humble (ha!) beginnings as part of the Ultramagnetic MC's), it makes sense that Keith would secure a guest spot from someone else from the same era: Sadat X from Brand Nubian. So it's too bad that this song sucks your father's nut sack with a child's bendable straw from Chick-Fil-A . Sadat and Keith never fully mesh with each other (I still don't believe they have ever met) over this shitty beat. This could have been interesting, but you could come up with a better collaboration yourself by mashing Keith and Sadat solo songs together at random.


9. INTRO 2 (FEAT KID CAPRI)
Black Elvis / Lost In Space's second intro, ostensibly to introduce the Black Elvis program for the evening, features Kid Capri for no real reason. But, unlike the first intro, this one only lasts twenty-five seconds. So there you go.


10. BLACK ELVIS
If this is what Black Elvis is going to sound like, then I would like someone to shoot me into space, please. Kool Keith's Black Elvis persona sounds suspiciously like every other Keith Thornton character ever: he comes across as a faceless goon who complains a lot about hip hop without ever offering any real solutions. Hey, kind of like bloggers! I bet Keith would be one ridiculously prolific blogger, if he had the time and wasn't so addicted to porn and stuff.


11. MAXI CURLS
The hook on here is ridiculous, but not in a funny way: the random references to “remote control alligators” lands squarely in the “heading in the wrong direction” field. Save for that, Keith's furious flying barbs connect more often than not, except when he decides to rhyme the alphabet (giving up after the letter “s”, anyway), right before chastising other rappers who have bitten his style. Not terrible, but not great.


12. KEITH TURBO
Starts off fairly stupid (the phrase “Keith Turbo”, which will probably become the man's next alias, is recited in lieu of an actual hook), but midway through Thornton grabs your attention with a slight beat switch and some hilarious boasts (“I could throw a hundred thousand pound walrus right through the wall!”; “Mad like five gorillas in the vocal booth!”) that force you to listen to the second half, at least. Sadly, the track as a whole never quite reaches the level of the boasts, but the song isn't a total loss: you two can use the walrus line to update your Facebook statuses, and everybody will think you're a fucking genius. Everybody except Keith Thornton, that is.


13. FINE GIRLS
Here's another song aimed at the mythical female audience, but this is actually more in line with Dr. Octagon's “Girl Let Me Touch You” in that it actually works, except for Keith's attempt to jump-start his first verse abruptly by shouting “I like your pretty eyes!” from out of nowhere. Like most rappers, Kool Keith feels that he can do a better job of taking care of your woman than you can. (I'm waiting for the first guy to knock a rapper the fuck out for even mildly suggesting that he is less of a man.) Keith's third verse takes a right turn into stalker territory, which was icky, but this was still okay.


14. THE GIRLS DON'T LIKE THE JOB
This high-concept track features Keith Thornton (who appears to have dropped the Black Elvis persona entirely) as a newly-promoted high-ranking officer at some unnamed corporation (that, apparently, both sells cars and signs artists, if you take these lyrics lyrically, and honestly, it's more fun when you do) who is a bit demanding on his secretarial pool. I would pay money to watch a basketball team owned by Kool Keith, but aside from that one-off line, this song is fairly bland, thereby overriding our host's unusually forced couplets. Oh well.


15. CLIFTON (FEAT NOGGIN NODDERS FROM OAKLAND &...SOME OTHER GUY, I GUESS)
Yes, Motion Man's guest spot is actually credited like that in the liner notes. Even though his previous collaborations with our host post-Dr. Octagonecologyst were uniformly entertaining, this one doesn't fare quite as well. In fact, it sounds fucking awful. The biggest shock was the third verse, performed by an unknown and uncredited guest artist whose lines are much more memorable than either of the two stars, not because they were any good or creative, but because he uses the word “fucking”, which made me realize that Black Elvis / Lost In Space is actually a swear-free excursion otherwise (unless you believe “tits” to be a curse word). Pass.


16. ALL THE TIME
Keith's instrumental is among his most accessible, so much so that he could have made some good money off of it had he sold it to some other Z-grade rapper on a different major. (I'm thinking Memphis Bleek, for some strange reason, although I'm aware that he is no longer on a major label.) The hook is garbage, but (say it with me now) this is a Kool Keith album, after all. This sounded pleasant enough, but I completely forgot all about Keith's declaration of dominance over all other rappers roughly ten seconds after the track faded out.


17. I DON'T PLAY
Keith Thornton ends Black Elvis / Lost In Space with aggressive taunts over a lazy instrumental, with a nonsensical hook nailing the epitome of a Kool Keith chorus. On Keith's best tracks, his ridiculous boasts incite disbelief and laughter (such as “I run rap like Mayor Koch” from “Livin' Astro”), but on his worst ones, you're left wondering why he doesn't simply proofread his lyrics first. Meh.


FINAL THOUGHTS: Kool Keith's major label debut is disappointing at best, which is a shame when you consider how well Black Elvis / Lost In Space started off. Keith's clean-sounding production actually lacks the heart that the man's best (non-self-produced) work possesses: only when others reign in Keith's sheer randomness can the man's brilliance behind the mic be fully appreciated. As a companion piece to Dr. Dooom's First Come, First Served, this album...well, let's be honest, the two projects only barely share an artist in common. Kool Keith's first major label album eschews accessibility for esoteric navel gazing at the expense of a growing fanbase. While Keith wouldn't have it any other way, that doesn't mean the fans that he still has don't deserve better. Black Elvis / Lost In Space is simply a concept album (okay, two different concept albums) gone awry.


BUY OR BURN? Burn this one. Aside from “Livin' Astro”, there isn't anything on here that you should throw your grandfather down a staircase just to get to faster.


BEST TRACKS: “Livin' Astro”


-Max


RELATED POSTS:
Catch up on Kool Keith's many aliases by clicking here.

My Gut Reaction: Ski Beatz - 24 Hour Karate School (September 21, 2010)

Producer Ski Beatz, who I will refer to as just Ski from this point forward because I think "Ski Beatz" sounds too close to "Swizz Beatz" and that annoys me, has the privilege of holding the coolest fucking album title of 2010 with his compilation project 24 Hour Karate School.  Unfortunately, he also holds the dubious honor of having one of the most anticipated projects of the year continuously pushed back and mutated to such a degree that it nowhere near resembles what it was once conceived of being.

First, some quick background.  Ski, known as David Willis whenever his parents were pissed off at him, was first noticed by a young Max as one of the producers on Jay-Z's debut album, Reasonable Doubt, contributing four tracks, including the well-received "Dead Presidents II" (and, technically, the original "Dead Presidents", which was a twelve-inch single release only, even though a video exists) and "Feelin' It" (more on that in a minute).  This partnership with a man who would soon become the biggest name in hip hop, one which lasted for two albums, was formed by Jay's friend and business partner Damon Dash, who inspired Ski to name his short-lived production company Roc-A-Blok (as he would be working in conjunction with Roc-A-Fella Records).  

Since man cannot live by bread alone, Ski also worked extensively with the rap duo Camp Lo, who were best known for their appreciation of 1970s culture and their anachronistic slang that still managed to sound interesting.  (Jay-Z's "Feelin' It" appears to have been a track originally given to the Lo, and bloggers have determined that Hova apparently lifted his flow from the unreleased version.  That's just a bit of trivia for those of you who give a fuck.)  But a funny thing happened on the way to the forum: Ski faded into the distance.  While he still produced songs ever once in a while (mainly for Camp Lo, although he did take an ill-advised trip with Pittsburgh Slim, who he somehow convinced Shawn Carter to sign to Def Jam), he pretty much kept to himself.

Until now, anyway.

Ski reunited with Dame Dash, who now hated Jay-Z with all of his might, and the two worked together to form DD172, a collective space that encouraged artists in all musical genres to collaborate and create without restriction.  DD172 also happens to be the name of Dame Dash's new vanity label, distributed through Def Jam Records (take that, Hova!), so the rappers involved, including such names as Mos Def, Jim Jones, Curren$y, and Stalley, nicknamed the endeavor the 24 Hour Karate School, a name that Ski borrowed for his album.

24 Hour Karate School is actually Ski's debut album, and having spent more than a decade devoted to his craft, he sticks with his work behind the boards and leaves the rhyming to the many professionals who fill the voids.  Take a quick look at the tracklist below: odds are that you will recognize a handful of names, but the rest of them will be brand new to your eyes, as they hope that their performances will lead you to follow their respective careers beyond this project.

One name you won't see on 24 Hour Karate School, though, is that of Mos Def.  Early promotion for the project, which seemed to start back in 1998 (this album has been promised for quite a while now) featured Dante as the headliner, making several appearances throughout.  The songs he was to be featured on even leaked to the Interweb.  But for unknown reasons, he refused to sign a release (even after having shot multiple videos), so Ski was left with the unpopular decision to erase his existence from 24 Hour Karate School entirely.  However, our host handled this setback with stride: he even promised to leak the unreleased mastered tracks himself at a later date, which may have been a defense mechanism protecting him from the almost-universal sigh of apathy that surrounded the project after its nineteenth release date was scrapped.  But Ski kept working up until the very last minute (which is why the final tracklisting is missing a song that appears on photos of the back cover released to blogs), and 24 Hour Karate School now actually exists, it's in my hands, and it's being reviewed.

1. NOTHING BUT US (FEAT. CURREN$Y & SMOKE DZA)

Instead of kicking off the project with a title track-slash-rap album intro as was the original plan, Ski skips straight to the music, giving blogger favorites Curren$y and Smoke DZA a backdrop that sounds like someone offstage is describing to them the fabulous prizes they could win if they bid closest to the suggested retail price during the Showcase Showdown. I liked DZA's line about being “higher than giraffe pussy”, but overall, neither one of these guys sold the song for me. If this is the average caliber of guest emcee that enrolled in the 24 Hour Karate School, you can consider me worried.

2. GO (FEAT. JIM JONES & CURREN$Y)

Jim Jones? Really? How in the fuck is he managing to score better cameos than the rest of his Dip Set brethren? You don't see Cam'Ron working alongside Pete Rock and The Black Keys, for fuck's sake. James sounds predictably boring on “Go”, although I must admit I liked his admission that “we want the cash, even though it's the root of Satan”. Curren$y redeems himself for his lackluster performance on “Nothing But Us” over a neurotic Ski beat that sounds like a precursor to Just Blaze's entire career, even though that would be impossible (unless Ski recorded this instrumental during Hova's Reasonable Doubt days, which probably isn't true). Erase James from this track, and you would have a one-verse banger.

3. PROWLER 2 (FEAT. JEAN GRAE, JAY ELECTRONICA, & JOELL ORTIZ)

When this song originally leaked to the Interweb and still contained a Mos Def verse, it was still called “Prowler 2”, so I have no idea what Part 1 is supposed to be. (Ski, if you're reading this, you're welcome to contribute an answer.) The good news is, even without Dante's presence, this song is still the shit: it's just a bit shorter. Underground superstars (or at least they should be) Jean Grae, Jay Electronica, and Joell Ortiz (best known these days for his Slaughterhouse affiliation) fucking kill it without the additional burden of a chorus. Ski laces the trio with a heavy, guitar-driven instrumental that you will want to listen to for an additional fourteen verses, it's that good. Joell seems to be the only guy on the project that took the concept of a 24 Hour Karate School literally, judging from his verse. This shit was nice.  (EDIT: A couple of readers have pointed out that I, very stupidly, neglected to mention that the sample used on this song comes from Dan Auerbach's "The Prowl", which helps explain the title somewhat.  Thanks, guys.)

4. DO IT BIG!! (FEAT. THE COOL KIDS & STALLEY)

I hated the chorus on here: although I love both movies and buttered popcorn, never has that particular pairing sounded so unappealing. The second verse is especially dull, which doesn't bode well for any possible write-ups for The Cool Kids that I may have eventually considered. Stalley, the only guy on here that sounds different than the rest, was pretty nice, but he was derailed by a Ski beat that was uncharacteristically bleh. Moving on...

5. S.T.A.L.L.E.Y. (FEAT. STALLEY)

Stalley, whose beard is fucking vanglorious, somehow scores a self-titled solo track on 24 Hour Karate School (he must have made the honor roll or something), and had it not been for the inane chorus, on which the guest star's name is spelled out for the listener over and over again as if we were watching an especially obnoxious episode of Sesame Street, I would be lavishing the song with praise. Instead, it's merely really good, with a “sometimes it's really fucking annoying” qualifier. Ski coughs up an instrumental with some nice hard drums, and Stalley is more than up to the challenge: if only he switched up the chorus and refrained from calling himself “the capital” (which just sounds goofy). Still, I liked this one overall.

6. NOT LIKE ME (FEAT. TABI BONNEY)

Ski's beat truly lends this song credibility that it doesn't even come close to achieving. Tabi Bonney's flow isn't bad or anything: it just isn't anything new or interesting, and his “hook” is mind-numbingly awful. But my God, the instrumental is a fucking banger. Someone needs to jack this beat and record a mixtape posse cut as soon as possible.

7. SCALING THE BUILDING (FEAT. WIZ KHALIFA & CURREN$Y)

On the rare occasion that I listen to a Wiz Khalifa song, I usually walk away unimpressed, not understanding why he's gotten so much blogger love. (You could say that about a lot of today's artists, actually.) I'm similarly underwhelmed on here, but it isn't just Wiz's performance and his really fucking stupid hook that makes me feel like I'm missing something: everything on here, from Curren$y's lackluster bars to Ski's mismatched beat, fails to gel into a cohesive bit of media. This track couldn't end fast enough for me.

8. SUPER BAD (FEAT. RUGZ D BEWLER)

Ski throws his hat into the “A Milli”-slash-”On To The Next One” ring, recruiting New York rapper Rugz D Bewler to narrate the prevalent staccato. I can imagine the instrumental growing more and more annoying and frustrating to listen to after about two minutes of the song's running time, and I wouldn't add this to my iTunes playlist or anything, but I didn't actually mind the beat all that much. Rugz, however, I minded greatly: he veers from merely passable (during the verses) all the way to abhorrent (during the shitty hook) in a relatively short time span. Sigh.

9. I GOT MINES (FEAT. TABI BONNEY, NIKKI WRAY, STALLEY, & RAS KASS)

Now we're getting back on track. This could easily be seen as the original version of “Prowler”, as this song also features a guitar-driven instrumental and rappers who straight-up spit. (Except for the fact that “I Got Mines” features a chorus performed by Nikki Wray, better known as former Missy Elliott apprentice Nicole Wray.  Although I kind of liked the hook, so I'll allow it.) Stalley and Tabi both sound refreshed, but Ras Kass, arguably the biggest star on 24 Hour Karate School after Dante was deleted, absolutely murders his competition, even with a flow that suggests that he had a cold the day he recorded his verse. Rassy should absolutely look to Ski for some musical guidance whenever he starts recording his next actual album. This shit was pretty badass.

10. BACK UPTOWN (FEAT. CAMP LO)

It wouldn't be a Ski album without an appearance from his most frequent collaborators Camp Lo. On “Back Uptown”, our host forces his guests to play by his rules, yanking them through a wormhole, taking them away from their comfort zone of funky 1970's-inspired beats in favor of a more militant, futuristic 2010 sound, and while the experiment doesn't fully pay off, it's at least interesting to listen to Geechi Suede And Sonny Cheeba rap over something that sounds like a much better fit for one of those shitty Busta Rhymes club bangers that pop up twice a year. Fans of the Lo's Uptown Saturday Night (an underrated gem in my book) will find little to no resemblance between that album and this art installation piece, but I found it just risky enough to enjoy, at least a little bit.

11. CREAM OF THE PLANET (INSTRUMENTAL)

Refusing to admit defeat, Ski includes the instrumental to a song that originally was to feature Mos Def. It's pleasant as hell, and it would make for excellent driving music, but since it has been sent to the back of the bus on here, this can't help but sound like an afterthought. It has a nice jazzy feel, but I'd rather listen to the original, which is readily available on the Interweb. Hell, I'd bet that Ski would rather listen to the original, too. Such is life.

12. TAXI (INSTRUMENTAL)

Everything I wrote about “Cream Of The Planet” also applies to this instrumental. And with that, we're done.

THE LAST WORD: Occasional lapse in judgment regarding the selection of certain guest artists aside, Ski Beatz makes his 24 Hour Karate School sound like the it preschool for hipster parents to sign their kids up for three years before they're even conceived. Ski may have preferred his background role over the past decade or so, bt he's smartly used his down time to craft his instrumentals with the care of a Hattori Hanzo blade, so 24 Hour Karate School is consistently enjoyable. I wish Ski had reached out to some other A-list talent for cameos after Mos Def flaked on him, but at the same time, 24 Hour Karate School proves that our host has been keeping an eye on the underground while actively seeking out new talent, which is the only way any producer will ever last in our chosen genre. Interest for this new project may have waned significantly thanks to a consistently changing release date (I'm pretty sure this album was originally supposed to drop in 1987), but 24 Hour Karate School emerges relatively unscathed, even with its last-minute adjustments. More importantly, I found this album to be enjoyable as fuck, so it's well worth both your money and your time. For the full effect, you should search the Interweb for all of the missing songs and make your own Ski Beatz playlist; I'm sure he won't mind.

-Max

Craig Mack - Project: Funk Da World (September 20, 1994)

In 1994, hip hop fans were witness to a penetrating double-fisted attack on their chosen genre by record label executive and all around camera hog Sean "Puffy" Combs, courtesy of his Bad Boy Records.  The first wave hit store shelves on September 13, when Christopher "The Notorious B.I.G." Wallace told anybody within earshot that he was Ready To Die, to the tune of millions of copies sold.  The immediate follow-up went on the offensive one week later (sixteen years ago today) in the form of Craig "Craig Mack" Mack's debut, Project: Funk Da World, which moved at least five hundred thousand units and helped Puff Daddy live to fight another day.


Wait, what?  Craig Mack's album came out after Biggie's?  Apparently so.  My memory must be failing me: I swear that Project: Funk Da World not only dropped first, but its first single, "Flava In Ya Ear", was a hit long before "Juicy" ever made anybody nostalgic for Mr. Magic and Marley Marl on the radio every Saturday.  But I've been wrong before.  So let's rewind a bit further back.


Craig Mack began life as the MC EZ half of MC EZ & Troup, releasing his debut single "Get Retarded" waaaaaaaaaaaay back in 1988, back when most of my two readers were hanging out in a nut sack somewhere.  (This song isn't very easy to find, but luckily, the helpful folks over at ego trip included it on their album The Big Playback, intended as a companion piece to their Big Book of Rap Lists.  It's worth the effort it takes to listen to it; if nothing else, you'll discover where Dr. Dre got his inspiration for his Bulworth soundtrack offering "Zoom".)  Mack worked sporadically after that, but a chance meeting with Puff Daddy led to a recording contract with the freshly minted Bad Boy Records and a guest spot on a Mary J. Blige song, "You Don't Have To Worry" (thanks to Puffy's management contract with the Queen of Hip Hop Soul). 


Craig Mack quickly recorded his debut, Project: Funk Da World, with the help of producer Easy Mo Bee, who handled five of the album's eleven tracks (Mack himself helmed another five, with Rashad Smith rounding things out).  His flow, which consisted of that of a mumbled Pete Rock mixed with a mouth full of peanut butter and marshmallow-flavored gravel, was an acquired taste, but it couldn't be denied that he brought something unique to the table.  Unfortunately, he was quickly overshadowed by his younger labelmate Biggie Smalls, who would go on to, um, bigger and better things (ironically, his career actually springboarded from a cameo appearance on a Craig Mack remix), while Mack was delegated to back office duties at Bad Boy before he left the label entirely.


Project: Funk Da World was the second full-length album released on Bad Boy, but it has quickly been reduced to but a footnote in the history of the man that now calls himself Diddy.  Hell, Craig Mack barely makes a dent in the Notorious B.I.G. biopic Notorious (although someone playing him does make a brief non-speaking appearance during a photo shoot), even though it is believed that Puffy originally had more faith in Mack than he did in his eventual cash cow.  This is one of those albums that may come up in conversation every once in a while, but nobody ever pretends that they've listened to it. 


But that's doing Craig Mack and the year 1994 a disservice.  Project: Funk Da World is the only other project from Bad Boy Records that wasn't dipped in blingy excess: Mack forced the radio to cater to his whims.  ("Flava In Ya Ear" is still considered a hip hop classic to this day, so at least our host for the evening receives the occasional royalty check.)  So let's join up with the five hundred thousand other satisfied (I'm guessing here) consumers who claim to own this album and see if it works as a distant cousin to Ready To Die, or if it's supposed to be its own animal.


1. PROJECT: FUNK DA WORLD
Problem number one: this is a rap album intro, plain and simple (although Craig does actually spit some bars – more on that in a bit). Problem number two: the intro is based around (what I assume to be) a fictional military campaign and/or terrorist organization initiating something called “Project: Funk Da World”; the audio is recorded at such a low level that it's hard to make out exactly what the fuck is going on half the time, not unlike watching a Michael Bay movie where the multiple jump cuts disorient the audience. The robotic voice that runs through the second half of this intro is also annoying and obtrusive. On the plus side, though, when Craig and his “I'm rhyming with all of these marbles in my mouth” flow kick in over this self-produced beat, I actually forgot about my initial issues with this intro, as his lyrics meld with the instrumental as if they were born to do so. All in all, this was half good and half fucking useless.


2. GET DOWN
The second single from Project: Funk Da World throws audiences off at first, as Puffy and Craigy felt it was appropriate to use the first forty seconds of the track to play random gibberish as a way to introduce “Get Down”. When Easy Mo Bee's beat finally begins, though, nostalgic feelings will start to rush back to my two readers who were cognizant of hip hop in the 1990s (everybody else may just enjoy the simplicity of the instrumental). Although I was never convinced in the least bit, I've always loved how Craig Mack says “I ain't scared of you motherfuckers”. Here, Craig pairs three verses (delivered in an accomplished manner that could only work in the 1990s) with a surprisingly not-annoying hook, and it all works. (Side note: Q-Tip (from A Tribe Called Quest, although I shouldn't have to continually remind you two at this point) even remixed “Get Down” at one point, but I've always preferred Mo Bee's original production work.)


3. MAKING MOVES WITH PUFF (FEAT PUFF DADDY)
You didn't really think that Puff Daddy would miss out on making a cameo appearance on an album released on his own fucking label, did you? Here, he even convinced Mack to make his nickname a part of the song's goddamn title, which is truly one of the most conceited things Puffy has ever done. (Even Biggie wouldn't have any of that shit.) As such, even though Craig Mack plays along admirably (his line “Power Rangers ain't more amazin'” dates this third single incredibly, but it worked at the time), the overt influence of Diddy on the track makes this a half-remembered nightmare that you'll want to shake off very quickly.


4. THAT Y'ALL
I don't understand why this song has a title that makes no fucking sense when taken all by itself: had it been called “Like That Y'all”, then it could have worked, especially since Craig never uses the title phrase within the track's context without throwing the word “like” in front of it. Anyway, even without the presence of his label boss, Mack turns in a truly shitty performance, his confidence behind the mic undermined while he awkwardly tries to salvage the beat that wouldn't make for a good rap song no matter how many rappers or other flourishes you threw on top of it. A decent interlude, maybe, but never a good song.


5. FLAVA IN YA EAR
This is Craig Mack's signature anthem. When the man dies, this shit will be played on a loop at his wake. And deservedly so: this track still bangs today, thanks to Easy Mo Bee's simple, masterful two-note production that can't help but make Mack's lyrics quotable. This is the first song on Project: Funk Da World that can legitimately be described as “funky”. This is actually a better first single than “Juicy” was for his labelmate, a fact even Puffy seemed to realize, as he quickly recruited Biggie Smalls (as well as LL Cool J, Busta Rhymes, and Rampage the Last Boy Scout) to appear on the remix, which set up the rare occurrence of an all-star remix actually outdoing the original song (and helping Biggie break through to the mainstream). But this is Craig Mack's song through and through, and the original is still really fucking good. Even Jennifer Lopez, of all people, thinks so, as her “Ain't It Funny” remix jacked this beat without any remorse whatsoever.


6. FUNK WIT DA STYLE
Mack's beat sneaks up on you with its dopeness, and even though, once again, the title makes no sense (this time it's more of a poor word choice than anything else), Craig Mack rides the instrumental just like the pony he rode that one year in summer camp. It's not flashy enough to have ever been released as a single, but it's nice in its own way. This was unexpected.


7. JUDGEMENT DAY
Conversely, this song was weak as shit, although Easy Mo Bee does his beat to make the track at least sound as dramatic as he can. Lyrically, this is just a “Get Down” retread, which wouldn't be completely horrible if it wasn't for what happens to be the downfall for many a rap artist: the chorus. Maybe more rappers should look to a professional songwriter like Diane Warren for more help with their hooks. Hell, it certainly couldn't hurt.


8. REAL RAW
This self-produced gem of a song (which could have been perfect (by Craig Mack standards, anyway) if not for the brief bit of homophobia thrown in for good measure) uses an old-school aesthetic combined with a more modern sound with great results. Mack spits his rhymes in an entertaining and easy-to-understand manner, and the beat comes across as damn near whimsical. This was much more entertaining than anybody would ever expect from our host: why wasn't this ever released to radio? “Bwees” everywhere would have been happy with it.


9. MAINLINE
At this point, Mack's flow gets the best of him, as he is fucking unintelligible over a weak Easy Mo Bee beat. And when you can't understand a goddamn thing the artist is saying, you are either (a) listening to Bob Dylan, or (b) relying on the underlying music to provide clues, and the instrumental doesn't make anybody want to mainline anything. This track was fairly awful.


10. WHEN GOD COMES
Craig Mack takes a serious tone on this song, trying to prepare all of his “bwees” for the Rapture. Or something. It isn't overly religious, but the track is about what will happen if the title event ever occurs, so be forewarned. The beat, provided by Mo Bee, is okay, and it's not as if what Craig has to say isn't true (aside from the titular occurrence, which really depends more on your religious preference): in fact, he makes a lot of good points (he even chastises radio stations for playing overly violent music that can be easily accessed by young children), but maybe I'm not in the mood to be preached to. Odds are, you two won't be, either.


11. WELCOME TO 1994
1994 was actually a pretty good year for a younger Max, but this song doesn't remind me of happier times at all. I'm almost afraid that younger readers will listen to this track and believe that all hip hop sounded this bad during the mid-nineties. I assure you, that is not the case: this song is merely an exception. It's also a fairly bad way to end the evening.


FINAL THOUGHTS: Craig Mack's Project: Funk Da World and The Notorious B.I.G.'s Ready To Die are almost night and day, which is odd, considering that they both share a record label, a label boss who insists on becoming as big a name as his employees, and even a producer (Easy Mo Bee). But while Biggie was concerned with appeasing the “real” hip hop heads while handling Puffy's (admittedly brilliant, in a business sense) requirement of appealing to the mainstream (read: women), Craig Mack had no such filter, and he had the freedom to record the album that he wanted. And what he wanted to record was a project for the heads that liked to pretend that the mainstream didn't even fucking exist in this dojo, even after “Flava In Ya Ear” blew up on the radio. Project: Funk Da World is not a perfect album by any means, and Craig Mack's own lyrical flow takes some getting used to: in fact, it's entirely probable that some listeners will never be able to understand a single mumbled word coming from his mouth. But for folks willing to make the effort, Bad Boy Records did them a solid, releasing an album with four bona fide great songs and other misfires that are, at the very least, interesting to hear. Craig Mack will never be in anybody's top five, but he can be proud of at least half of the work found on Project: Funk Da World, because that means he will never be looked at as the weakest artist on the Bad Boy roster when the history books are written.


BUY OR BURN? Why the fuck not? You may as well pick this one up. It was touch and go for me for a while, but ultimately the tracks listed below tipped the scales. Don't go into this one expecting Craig Mack's version of a Biggie album, and you'll do alright.


BEST TRACKS: “Flava In Ya Ear”; “Real Raw”; “Get Down”; “Funk Wit Da Style”


-Max

DJ Honda - h (a/k/a DJ Honda) (July 2, 1996)

DJ Honda is a Japanese turntablist and music producer who started his musical career the natural way: by doing almost the opposite of what he ended up doing.  According to his official bio on his website, unless he really enjoys fucking with people, he was a singer and guitar player in a rock band called The Clique, and he took up the two turntables and a microphone as a second job to help make ends meet.  In a storybook ending that typically happens to people that aren't you, Honda became better known for his deejay skills, spinning the shit out of exclusive parties and remixing the living fuck out of already existing songs.  Also, he punched a puppy in the face.  Not for any real reason, though: it was a Tuesday, and he was drunk with power and Jameson.


After making a name for himself in the States in a turntable competition (one of those things that occurs frequently in cities that aren't the one you live in), DJ Honda relocated to Los Angeles and proceeded to record an album, h (or DJ Honda, depending on where you look: his own website calls it h so I'm going with that), that had a very obvious East Coast bent.  In a happy coincidence that only happens in romantic comedies and in the music industry, Honda's performance in the aforementioned competition won him many fans, most of whom jumped at the chance to work with him on his debut project.  Honda accepted those returned favors from the likes of The Beatnuts, most of Brand Nubian, Common, Tha Alkaholiks, Fat Joe, Redman, Guru and DJ Premier of Gang Starr, and a few unknowns to even out the playing field.


h was released by Relativity Records in 1996, and while it wasn't destined to move millions of units, it sold well enough to keep Honda rolling in new puppies to punch in the face, and its critical acclaim helped him build his name with additional albums and up to the present day, where he has added entrepreneur and CEO to his official title on his nameplate, which looks much more respectable than simply listing 'DJ Honda: Friend of Psycho Les'.


Here is h in all of its glory.


1. INTRO
A short and sweet musical introduction. Not bad.


2. DJ BATTLE
Since this is his show and all, DJ Honda gives himself a deejay cut right out of the gate. Can't say that I blame the guy: I'd probably do the exact same shit.


3. WHAT YOU EXPECTED (FEAT GANG STARR)
For the first actual song on h, DJ Honda calls in a favor from both halves of Gang Starr: the late Guru (R.I.P.) provides vocals while DJ Premier scratches the shit out of the “hook”. I've never cared for the music on this song: for me, it sounds too smooth for someone with Guru's monotone to spit over as precisely as we're used to. But he does his best and mostly succeeds, giving the project an early injection of street cred. Although this is Honda's time to shine, I was left wishing that Primo handled the production end of the bargain, or at least remixed the song: hell, Primo provided the beat for that Gang Starr track on Tony Touch's The Piecemaker, so it wouldn't be unheard of.


4. KILL THE NOIZE (FEAT PROBLEMZ)
DJ Honda gives New York rapper (and occasional Beatnuts accomplice) Problemz a solo showcase with “Kill The Noize”, but I don't understand exactly why: after hearing the song, I find him to sound just as generic as every other thug rapper out there in the world. The beat also manages to go absolutely nowhere, possibly because the rhymes fail to transcend it. So of course Problemz ends up being the guy who, in the future, gets his own album with the help of DJ Honda. Maybe he's seeing something that I can't, but this song isn't very good. I call them like I see them.


5. DAT'S MY WORD (FEAT REDMAN)
Reggie Noble takes over the proceedings in his Dare Iz A Dark Side phase, destroying motherfuckers even with a lame-ass hook that consists of a single Redman sound bite being scratched to infinity by Honda. Wow, that was kind of a long run-on sentence. Anyway, this track slides successfully into Redman's catalog, as he proves that he is truly able to rhyme over absolutely any beat, even those from outside of his home country. This shit was just nice, and Honda complements his guest's vocals nicely.


6. STRAIGHT TALK FROM NY (FEAT SADAT X, GRAND PUBA, & WAKEEM)
This track, which purports to contain some straight talk from the New York area, is kind of a hot mess. Sadat X spends his time providing a terrible chorus and singing the praises of all of the Japanese women that he wants to fuck, Wakeem (an artist who up and vanished after h was released) talks about absolutely nothing in particular, and Sadat's Brand Nubian partner Grand Puba closes things out by complaining about how Tommy Hilfiger has yet to pay him for “putting [them] on the map”. I enjoy songs that shoot the shit as much as the next guy, but there's no actual here here: this track was randomness set to a bland instrumental. You three had to hook up with DJ Honda to talk about nothing?


7. INTRO
Not as short as the other intro, but at least it's still just a musical interlude with sound bites and not a goofy skit, as most other albums would succumb to.


8. OUT FOR THE CASH (FEAT AL TARIQ, THE BEATNUTS, FAT JOE, & PROBLEMZ)
The beat on here is pretty fucking dope. All of the emcees (Al Tariq reunites with his former Beatnuts crew) punch in and punch out quickly and efficiently, save for Problemz, the last guy to appear, who was clearly being groomed by Honda for bigger and better things (although the jury's still out as to whether that act of charity is justified or not). To his credit, Problemz doesn't sound bad on here: maybe his talent lies in collaborations. This shit sprints by so quickly that you're left wishing it went on for another five verses.


9. INTERLUDE (FEAT COMMON)
With that misleading title, you're forgiven if you skip past it by accident, but you should know that this is actually a one-verse wonder from Chicago's own Common. For his part, Lonnie sounds Resurrection-era good, so when the track ends abruptly, you're left wanting more, which is one of the best things anybody can ever say about an artist.


10. BIZ FREESTYLE (FEAT BIZ MARKIE)
This is allegedly a “freestyle”, but it's nearly five minutes in length and contains the traditional verse-chorus-verse song structure, so take that title with a grain of salt. True, Biz Markie's crazed pop-culture ramblings are barely cohesive enough to qualify as lyrics ((the third verse consists mostly of The Biz listing names for no real reason), but nevertheless, this is an actual song, and should be graded as such. Honda's beat is simple and nice, but thanks to the vocals, you'll only want to listen to this just the one time.


11. FUK DAT (FEAT SEAN BLACK)
Sean Black, another unknown artists who DJ Honda counts among his friends even though he doesn't get nearly as much screen time as Problemz, also receives a solo showcase, and he fares much better than that guy. There isn't anything on here that will help him stand out in the crowd, but his verses were confidently delivered, and Honda's instrumental complemented him beautifully. This was simply an entertaining track.


12. INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM (FEAT THA ALKAHOLIKS)
All three members of West Coast party animals Tha Alkaholiks (including the typically behind-the-scenes E-Swift) touch down in Japan (relatively speaking) and record a song that sounds a lot like something that they could have come up with on their own. That is in no way a criticism, though: aside from the terrible hook (h is chock full of those), this shit bangs, and Tash (as usual) rips shit like nobody's business. (What is that expression supposed to actually mean, anyway? How would the phrase “nobody's business” somehow signify excellence in any given field?) This shit was fucking nice.


13. THE END (FEAT AL TARIQ)
Al Tariq resumes his solo career to wax lyrically about the end of the world and Armageddon or some shit. The point is, Honda's beat is far too peaceful for it to be the soundtrack to the destruction of life as we know it and the return of Jesus Christ (this song has a heavy religious bent to it). The rhymes themselves are alright, as they most definitely deviate from anything that you would expect a former member of The Beatnuts to talk about, but the song itself was pretty skippable.


European pressings of h cap off the evening with a couple of bonus tracks. For some reason, this is the version that I actually have, so we will continue...right now.


14. OUT FOR THE CASH (5 DEADLY VENOMS) (FEAT AL TARIQ, THE BEATNUTS, FAT JOE, & COMMON)
Kind of a sequel-slash-remake of the song that appeared earlier on h (although a sound bite taken from this song appeared on that previous cut, which can only mean that h is the Möbius strip of hip hop albums), but the lyrics are all new, and Problemz has been replaced by Common because shut up, that's why. Psycho Les gets the longest verse for some reason, but everyone on here simply rhymes for the fun of it (especially Al Tariq, who reverts back to his older Kool Fashion moniker on here), and that feeling is pretty fucking contagious. The multiple shout-outs to Honda mush have made him feel pretty good, too. Large Joseph ends his contribution by bringing up that 2Pac is innocent which brings up a good point: nobody ever really seemed to discuss Pac's legal situation on wax (save for the man himself, obviously). Do you two believe that he was innocent of the charges made against him? Discuss.


15. WHAT YOU EXPECTED (INSTRUMENTAL)
Plays out exactly as it reads. And with that, we're good.


DJ Honda also apparently released an alternate version of h in his native Japan which, instead of containing a few exclusive bonus tracks, appears to be an entirely different album, with completely different songs, a whole other roster of guest artists, and the original first take of Redman's “Dat's My Word”. According to Discogs, the only songs that survived the cut was “Out For The Cash (5 Deadly Venoms)”, “What You Expected”, and Biz Markie's “freestyle”. That's a pretty interesting exclusive to give to your home country. I most certainly do not have that version of h, so I can't comment on it, but if any of you two are privy to the information contained within, leave some notes below.


FINAL THOUGHTS: DJ Honda's h is a mostly satisfying view of hip hop as seen through the perspective of an outsider, the main qualifier in this case being location. His scope isn't that grand for a first outing (a lot of his guests make multiple appearances), but Honda succeeds with his version of East Coast hip hop, even if it appears at times that he's falling into the trappings of our chosen genre without bringing anything new to the party. (“International Anthem”, in which DJ Honda plays host to West Coast stalwarts Tha Alkaholiks, is the lone exception, if only because it sounds like an impersonation of the West Coast's musical output.) A lot of this is still entertaining as hell today, and it's easy to see the potential in our host being realized eventually, so while not every track works, enough of h will make listeners happy.


BUY OR BURN? You could probably find this one pretty cheap, so I would suggest you spend the money. It isn't that great of a commitment to sit and listen to, and the odds are pretty good that you'll find something to like on here.


BEST TRACKS: “Out For The Cash (5 Deadly Venoms)”; “Out For The Cash”; “Dat's My Word”; “International Anthem”; “Fuk Dat”


-Max

Mos Def - True Magic (December 29, 2006)

Mos Def's third solo album True Magic has a strange story behind it, one which is so off-kilter that it's a surprise that it even exists.  What follows is the short version of that tale.


The artist also known as The Italian Job's Dante Smith took time out of his busy acting schedule to lay some tracks down in a Canadian recording studio in 2006, two years after his sophomore effort, The New Danger, was met with critical scorn.  However, rumor has it that Mos Def was unhappy with his record contract, and he was determined to do whatever it took to secure his release, up to and including dropping an album that in no way fits in with the rest of the man's output.


True Magic, formerly titled Tru3 Magic back when Mos Def still gave a fuck, was rushed to stored at the very end of December in 2006, just in time for Geffen Records to consider it a tax write-off.  Not that they spent that much money on the project to begin with: fans who flocked to their local record stores on the release date were shocked by the album's lack of cover art and liner notes.  Indeed, True Magic came packaged in a plastic jewel case with a sticker on the back, instructing listeners to visit a website to find out something, anything, about the album's production.  Because Mos Def is what is known as a "conscious" rapper, multiple excuses were made for the simplicity of the packaging: some even believed that Dante was trying to do his part in protecting the environment (um, he packed the disc in fucking plastic, so that wasn't it).


The fourteen tracks on True Magic were also surprising to Mos Def's fans, as they all consisted of what seemed to be incomplete songs.  So the idea started floating around that this version of True Magic was a sampler that Geffen Records put out in order to gauge the public's interest in the project.  MTV even posted a news story in which an anonymous source claimed that the "full" version of True Magic, complete with the traditional trappings of liner notes, album artwork, and actual songs, was scheduled to hit stores a few months later.


Geffen Records had to issue a press release that basically said: "Nope.  This is it.  You guys are fucked."


So here we are.  True Magic was Mos Def's final album for Geffen Records, and it sounds like a rush job intended solely for getting the man out of his contract.  None of the tracks were handled with care: hell, most of them sound unfinished.  Two of them lift well-known hip hop beats in such a manner that Mos Def may as well be tried and convicted of plagiarism.  One of the songs only contains two fucking sentences, repeated over and over again.  Producers Preservation and Minnesota, along with others, attempted to justify their paychecks by providing the music to Mos Def's mental breakdown, but Dante fails to comply, wasting their instrumentals like a jackass billionaire lighting up his Cuban cigars with hundred dollar bills while insisting on using a check at the grocery store.


And yet, there are people that like this crapshoot much more than The New Danger, which I genuinely liked, but I'm aware that most of you thought I was being ironic (best case scenario) or that I have terrible taste (worst case).


Well, explain this shit, fuckers.


1. TRUE MAGIC
Oddly, Mos Def's third album kicks off with a title track that sounds like every other mainstream rap song out there, thanks to DJ Epik and Mark Knoxx's generic instrumental. Pretty Flaco mumbles his way through two verses that you couldn't force yourself to concentrate on even if someone put a gun to your head, making what is essentially a rap album intro even more excruciating than usual. Having the track fade out at the end and then surprising listeners by bringing the beat back might have worked had the instrumental been something worth bringing back in the first place. Personally, I would have left it on the side of the highway. You know, like a normal person.


2. UNDENIABLE
You're forgiven if you thought the previous track was called “Undeniable”; I was a bit confused myself, as Mos kept using that word throughout the “chorus”. He does the same thing on here: I think one of his friends bet him fifty bucks that he wouldn't use the title word fifty-plus times on True Magic. This track featured one of the more creative ways to sample “Message From A Black Man” from The Whatnauts, but so many artists have used it (both before and since) that any heft the track may have carried back in 2006 is diluted. So far, this shit is making me long for The New Danger.


3. U R THE ONE
What exactly were you trying to do with True Magic, Mos? Do you even remember at this point? Because this kind of shit wasn't on anybody's wish list.


4. THUG IS A DRUG
Even though “True Magic” led directly into “Undeniable”, neither of those songs sounded coherent together. That's the biggest problem I have with True Magic: it's sequenced like a greatest hits compilation from an alternate universe where music generally sucks. On here, Mos Def attempts a violent take sprinkled with social commentary, but it sounds pretty awful. Even The New Danger had more fascinating songs than this throwaway disc of half-thought-out concepts. No wonder the label didn't even bother with any sort of marketing budget: why waste more money than they absolutely had to?


5. CRIME & MEDICINE
Pretentious as shit. I'm okay with Dante jacking GZA's “Liquid Swords” beat wholesale (I just hope Prince Rakeem received a royalty check), and his verse is relatively inoffensive, in that the rhymes themselves aren't great but they also aren't annoying. No, the lone characteristic of “Crime & Medicine” that sets me off is the female voice that says the phrase “strange times” right before Mos begins his verse. For some reason, I can't fucking stand that shit. His singing was a weirdly interesting take on the GZA's original hook, but for the most part, this made me angry.


6. A HA
I don't care what some of the other critics believe: Mos Def most certainly did not intend True Magic to challenge your ideals of what a hip hop albums was supposed to sound like. He merely rushed fourteen tracks out in an effort to remove himself from his label, where he was unhappy. How is this kind of shit supposed to challenge anything? It contains a laugh track, for fuck's sake.


7. DOLLAR DAY (SURPRISE, SURPRISE)
Mos Def's tribute to those affected by the events of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 takes a strange turn when he adapts New Orleans artists UTP's “Nolia Clap” for his own purposes. Dante's criticisms about former President Bush's (lack of a) response to the destruction is undercut by the ironic use of the original beat from the Juvenile-led trio's song, which was more likely to make people dance and celebrate life's excesses than make them upset with politicians. Flaco has something worth saying on here, and this was a better outlet than calling out Bush's stupid ass on live television (*cough* Kanye West *cough*), but this still sounded a little off. And very mixtape-ish, not unlike “Crime & Medicine”.


8. NAPOLEON DYNAMITE
Mos titled this two-minute “song” after one of the most overrated cult movies of our time (is it really a “cult” movie if millions of fucking people have suffered through it?), but it has nothing to do with Jon Heder's character. In fact, I had a problem following Dante's narrative, which I think was a crime tale told without much context. And then he ends the “song” by saying “Moving on”, lending more credence to my theory that True Magic was recorded in a twelve-hour period in a haze of Patron and skunky Canadian weed.

9. THERE IS A WAY
When Dante tells listeners that this song consists of only “two lyrics”, he isn't kidding. The entire song is made up of two sentences repeated ad nauseum: “There is a way no matter what they say” and “Don't give up, Don't give in”. Which makes this an easy song to memorize, but can this really be called a “song”? This would have been far more appropriate as an outro. Sigh.


10. SUN, MOON, STARS
Meh.


11. MURDER OF A TEENAGE LIFE
This is the most complete track on True Magic thus far, and it still sounds unfinished. Over an uncharacteristically synth-free and somber Neptunes beat, Mighty Mos spits about the loss of childhood, both literally and figuratively. This wasn't a very good song: its execution is lacking severely. But it's still the closest to a regular Mos Def song that you'll actually hear on True Magic. Groan.


12. FAKE BONANZA
Preservation's beat, which may only sound like a Spaghetti Western in its execution because the song is, in fact, called “Fake Bonanza”, sounds decent enough (although it's looped to death), and Dante feels at ease telling his story, but then, with two minutes left on the clock, Mos just evaporates, and the song continues well beyond its natural ending, and when you peel away all of the layers, the track is left naked and embarrassed. This was a prime example of a decent song getting fucked over by Mos Def's lack of precision. Which wasn't entirely by design, no matter what you may believe.


13. PERFECT TIMING
Mos sings his own interpretation of rap lyrics from other, much better songs, which doesn't make for much of a track, but was an interesting experiment. Dante's piano-driven beat was also appropriately haunting. But I can't recommend that anybody listen to this track ever.


14. LIFETIME
I liked the music underneath Dante's crooning vocals, but there wasn't enough variation to justify the over five minutes of your life that this song will occupy, should you choose to listen to it. But I have to say that Preservation's beat was still thoroughly soothing, and Mos Def worked with it well. Some of this is cheesy (mainly the chorus), but “Lifetime” is the best song on an album that has no idea what to do with itself, now that it's awake so goddamn early. And it's the final song on the album. Funny, that.


FINAL THOUGHTS: What the fuck did I just listen to? It's as though Mos Def was playing a prank on his audience: True Magic plays better as an art installation than it does as an album in any musical genre, and it is incredibly hard to actually listen to. With few exceptions, Dante fails to stick with any topic long enough to wrap a coherent song around it: True Magic is filled with incomplete thoughts that weren't necessarily worth having in the first place. A couple of the songs sound okay, but Mos Def should be called out for his blatant theft of the “Liquid Swords” and “Nolia Clap” beats, which make True Magic sound even more like an afterthought, in a “Hey, I recorded these two songs for mixtapes, but I need to fill some space, so let's just put them on here, why the fuck not?”-kind of way. I'm surprised that there are so many True Magic supporters out there while The New Danger is universally reviled: True Magic fucking sucks balls. At least The New Danger was focused. Fuck this album.


BUY OR BURN? Um, didn't you just see that I wrote the phrase “fuck this album”?


BEST TRACKS: “Lifetime”


-Max


RELATED POSTS:
The other Mos Def albums I've written about work with varying degrees of success. Read about them by clicking here.