Erick Sermon - Music (October 30, 2001)

Having parted ways with longtime label home Def Jam Records, producer-slash-rapper Erick Sermon found himself bouncing around while seeking out the best possible deal for both himself and, eventually, his Def Squad Records imprint. This soul-searching journey found him briefly living on Dreamworks Records’ couch under a fake name, Erick Onasis, a partnership which resulted in one lone album, Def Squad Presents Erick Onasis, which is best known for having several great songs and also pissing me off so much that I considered excising Sermon from my project entirely, thereby negating his historical significance within hip hop. No, it’s true, it’s in his biography and everything. (If you don’t recall the specifics, you should double back to that review just to catch up.) But that living situation was merely temporary, and soon Sermon was back out in the world trying to find himself, during which time he found himself doing peyote in the desert with storied record executive Clive Davis’ J Records, which resulted in the man’s fourth solo effort (and third under his government name), the aptly-titled Music.

To hear the man tell it, Sermon was hunted down by Davis directly after word was out that Def Jam had dropped him from their roster. Davis had just formed his imprint after he was ousted from his longtime post at Arista Records, and he needed A-list talent to help get the label off the ground. For a time, Sermon shared a creative home with Busta Rhymes (also recruited by Davis directly), Alicia Keys, Rod Stewart, Maroon 5, and Annie Lennox. You’ve probably noticed that there aren’t many fellow rappers on that list, which helps explain why Sermon’s tenure at J Records was relatively brief.

Music dropped one year after Def Squad Presents Erick Onasis, but while the overall sound across both albums remains consistent, Sermon’s own status within the industry had changed significantly. Music was propelled by and sold on its lead single, “Music”, which featured Sermon rhyming around an extended vocal sample from the late Marvin Gaye. “Music” was inexplicably popular at pop radio, scoring the man the biggest hit of his career and inserting him onto playlists of stations one would never think to hear an Erick Sermon production. The popularity of “Music” helped its namesake album move a bunch of units, which was a good way for Sermon to repay his financial backers at J.

Music is notable for its release date, as well: it dropped roughly one-and-a-half months after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. “Music” had been serviced to radio since June of that year, and was already a hit, but my theory, which likely isn’t that far off, is that the runaway success of that particular record (which was so hot, it scored Gaye a posthumous hit song, as his vocals throughout are so prevalent that he was given a feature credit) is due to the overall climate in the United States post-terror attacks, when we as a country were trying to move forward with our lives in a time of extreme uncertainty and fear. “Music” is simply a feel-good song about the power of music, mixed with a little bit of braggadocio from our host, and it could have been what the country needed to hear to push itself forward a bit. Music did end up becoming Sermon’s second biggest-selling album of his career, and it wasn’t because of the release date’s proximity to Halloween, I’m just saying.

1. RAPTURE

Sermon… does not do a good job with dramatizing the rapture on this introductory skit. It’s mostly comprised of reporters confused about the events that are transpiring right in front of them, and The Leftovers this is not. What even is this? And why is this here when Sermon never gets back to it at any point on Music?

2. IT’S NUTTIN’ (FEAT. KHARI & DAYTONA)

Our host gets the one song on Music he didn’t produce out of the way very quickly. “It’s Nuttin'” was outsourced to Rockwilder, and the instrumental sounds very Rockwilder-esque, but it isn’t bad, even if it’s not the best fit for E Double, who opens the track and cedes the rest to his protégées. You’ve never heard of either Daytona or Khari since, but they both do well on here: Daytona, in particular, sounds like a grittier street version of Sermon himself, while Khari has a Lord Have Mercy-type flow without the gruff vocals. Far from essential listening, and it does a terrible job of reintroducing the star of the show, but taken as is, just as a song on a thing, it’s fine.

3. COME THRU

Our host will handle production duties for the rest of the evening, so expect many more rubberband bass and easy-listening boom bap throughout Music. Over what sounds very much like a rejected beat from Def Squad Presents Erick Onasis, Sermon spits two verses filled with the type of braggadocio only an artist who has been a part of this game since the 1980’s could believably provide. Although he sounds alright over his own beat, “Come Thru” finds him fairly bored, or at least that’s how he comes across to the listener. The uncredited vocals from Cha Cha during the hook, which are neither good nor necessary, sound like she’s doing an ill-advised impression of Lil’ Kim, which may cause you to wonder what Kimberly would sound like over an E-Double beat, and frankly, you’d be right to do so. Sigh.

4. MUSIC (FEAT. MARVIN GAYE)

Erick Sermon’s biggest solo hit was first featured on the soundtrack to the Martin Lawrence and Danny DeVito vehicle What’s The Worst That Could Happen?, but migrated over to our host’s fourth solo project and even inspired the title, mostly because J Records didn’t want there to be any confusion as to whether the song was a part of the project. (Instead, the confusion comes from the fact that the album’s title doubles as our host's preferred form of media. “Hey Scott, where does the Erick Sermon music go?” “What the fuck are you talking about?”) The sampled vocals from the late, great Marvin Gaye (borrowed from a demo song entitled “I’ve Got My Music”, conveniently) are so prevalent throughout that the deceased crooner receives a feature credit, which is ridiculous, but what’s even worse is how there are still radio stations out there that play R&B but refuse to acknowledge hip hop, so Sermon had to cut a version of “Music” that keeps Gaye but removes all of his own vocals, and it’s his fucking song. Does “Music” hold up today? That would imply that it did so back in 2001, you two. I think most alleged fans of the song responded to the novelty of hearing Marvin Gaye on contemporary radio airwaves, but aside from Sermon’s incessant need to curse on here (seriously, was including the phrase, “What the fuck?” really necessary?), it’s wholly inoffensive. You likely would never seek it out, though. Moving on…

5. SKIT I

…

6. NOW WHAT’S UP (FEAT. REDMAN, KEITH MURRAY, & SY SCOTT)

Surely I’m not the only person out here who goes into an Erick Sermon solo project wondering how Reggie Noble is going to sound, am I? Fellow Redman enthusiasts get their first opportunity to check in on his progress with the Def Squad posse cut “Now What’s Up”, a more dramatic than usual Sermon production over which he, Redman, Keith Murray, and even Sy Scott try to one-up one another with boasts-n-bullshit. Keith “Keith Murray” Murray opens with a decent performance that doesn’t rank anywhere near his best, but it’s nice to hear him alongside his bandmates, while E-Double and the Funk Doc sound alright, if not very memorable. I’ve always wondered if Sermon is frustrated over all of the money and time he invested in Sy Scott over the years for him to never really go anywhere, but he sounds pumped to be no longer seated at the kids’ table, so. “Now What’s Up” still functions as one of the better tracks on Music, though, even with my paragraph chock-full of not-so-winning endorsements. I wish Sy Scott had been swapped out for Mally G, though.

7. I’M THAT N---A

Not very engaging at first, as Sermon sounds about as bland as he does on most of his solo stuff over a generically simple, elastic instrumental, but around the time our host delivers the legitimately great line, “I’m coming with a vengeance, like ‘you killed my father’”, a funny thing happens on the way to the forum: you start to dig “I’m That N---a”, so much so that a racist remark during the second if his two lengthy verses only slightly derails this train. After that one bar (not the racist one), you start to recognize just how cocky Erick Sermon sounds, boasting the overconfidence of a producer-slash-rapper who really has been on the more successful side of the rap game throughout his entire career up to this point. Not bad.

8. GENIUS E DUB (FEAT. OLIVIA)

Undoubtedly, you two read the song title and discerned precisely which sample Erick Sermon would take liberties with, and I’m here to let you know, you are exactly motherfucking correct. I’m not sure just what our host thought he could do differently with the Tom Tom Club’s “Genius of Love”, but I will give him just a minute amount of credit: “Genius E Dub” doesn’t sound like Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy”, as he at least tries to freak the sample in a different manner. He even throws in a sound bite from the “host” of A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders album for good measure (similar to what he did on Method Man & Redman’s “Y.O.U.”). But everything about “Genius E Dub”, from the beat to the presence of not-yet-G-Unit vocalist (and J Records labelmate) Olivia on the hook, screams, “Hey radio, please play me! Pretty please?!”, and he even mentions the song “Music” during the first verse, so he was definitely chasing that particular dragon again, although whether that was at the behest of J, or E’s own doing, is the question.

9. SKIT II

…

10. AIN’T NO FUTURE… 2001

It doesn’t matter that our host shouts him out at the very beginning of this track, I’m convinced Erick Sermon, at the very least, used to have a major problem with West Coast stalwart MC Breed, first removing his contribution from Too Short’s “Buy You Some” when he dickishly repurposed the song on Def Squad Presents Erick Onasis as “Fat Gold Chain” (a decision that will forever taint Sermon in my eyes – both the recycling of the track and erasing Breed from history) , and now by ripping off (by way of “paying homage”) Breed’s biggest hit and most well-known song, “Ain’t No Future In Your Frontin’”. The instrumental is fun and bouncy as shit, not just because it recalls the same sampled funk slabs E and PMD used regularly for their group efforts, but because it’s essentially the same fucking beat as on Breed’s track. Our host sounds fine over it, but the entire existence of this was off-putting to me, so I could never bring myself to care about it all that much.

11. DO-RE-MI (FEAT. LL COOL J & SCARFACE)

Kind of corny, especially as our host and his guests incorporate the titular theme into the chorus, which is more than a bit of a reach, but “Do-Re-Mi” features an absolutely fucking fire LL Cool James verse. Yep, you read that correctly: the current host of Lip Sync Battle kills his cameo with an aggressive turn that suits him: apparently there’s something about working with E-Double that brings the animal out of him (see also: “4,3,2,1”; EPMD’s “Rampage”; Keith Murray’s “Incredible”). Houston’s own Scarface doesn’t fare nearly as well: his more methodical plotting comes across as awkward as fuck over the faster-paced Sermon instrumental, so much that it’s kind of embarrassing. What’s Face even doing on this song, anyway? How did this collaboration get dreamed up? Erick himself is merely alright, too: just skip ahead once LL’s finished and you’ll be straight.

12. I’M HOT

Ever the opportunist, Sermon tries to capture lightning in a bottle twice with “I’m Hot”, the second (and final, as far as I can remember) single from Music, and also the second song in his catalog to “feature” Marvin Gaye, although not quite enough to earn the late artist another credit. (Which makes the “Music” remix the actual second song in Sermon’s discography that truly names Gaye as his co-star, but whatever.) “I’m Hot” didn’t receive nearly as much attention as the hit single “Music”, though, and that’s because it’s paint-by-numbers E-Double, from the rubberband bass to the lame writing: hell, even the vocal sample (this time from the far-better-known “Sexual Healing”) are deployed in a rather dreary manner. I feel that another artist could have worked this instrumental to their advantage, but Sermon’s greedy ass kept it for himself, and ultimately it just. Doesn’t. Work.

13. UP THEM THINGS (FEAT. KEITH MURRAY & CADDILLAC TAH)

The Green-Eyed Bandit tries to update his sound a bit: “Up Them Things” shares more in common with the likes of Rockwilder of DJ Scratch than it does, well, Erick Sermon, and that shift in style is welcomed, especially since we’re almost fucking finished here. Our host seems emboldened by his own decision, if not exactly inspired, but his boasts-n-bullshit are decent, as are those from guest Cadillac Tah Murda (of Ja Rule and Irv Gotti’s Murderers collective). Tah does sound too much like Ja for it to not be completely distracting, though. Keith Murray swoops in to provide the last verse, and at least sounds better than he did on “Now What’s Up”, even if he seems to be a bit overwhelmed by the instrumental. I’m entirely over this album, by the way, if you couldn’t tell.

14. THE SERMON

Now this confuses me. R. Kelly figures so prominently on “The Sermon” that his not receiving a feature credit makes zero sense. I get that his “cameo” comes from a sample of his “What I Feel / Issues”, but “Music” featured a Marvin Gaye sample and his estate got paid. Not like I want the man to get a win or anything, of course. There’s absolutely no chance this actually happened, but if Robert Kelly the pedophile received zero compensation for his “participation” on “The Sermon”, that would please me like very little else in this world. Oh, what did I think of the song? It sucked. Our host’s beat was repetitive noise that seemed to request a double-time flow, which E-Double has no business attempting, so I’m not sure who this was made for.

15. SKIT III

Friendly reminder that the “Rapture” mentioned during the intro never comes back up.

16. MUSIC (REMIX) (FEAT. REDMAN, KEITH MURRAY, & MARVIN GAYE)

It’s only natural for Sermon to want to revisit his biggest hit song, this time giving his friends in the Def Squad the opportunity to play in the sandbox. At least our host fucks around with the, er, music a bit: the Marvin Gaye samples throughout are different from the original version, so this plays as an alternate take that had been scrapped and then revived by the likes of Keith Murray and Reggie Noble. Having run out of things to say this evening, Sermon doesn’t even bother performing a verse on “Music (Remix)”, sticking to the boards, save for an occasional ad-lib. The track sounds incomplete (see above, where I wrote it plays as a scrapped alternate take), but the guests are engaging enough, and there are way worse ways to end a project.

According to Wikipedia and random websites, it’s likely that an earlier version of Music ended with a track allegedly entitled “Headbanger 2001”, which was to have been credited to EPMD. Had it been included, it would have easily been the best song of the entire fucking album, as the chemistry between E and Parish Smith is palpable and contagious throughout. My best guess is that it was removed because its sound was much darker than that of the rest of Music, so it would have clashed with the overall poppy vibe a bit too obviously. If you believe you missed out on something special, though, don’t fret, PMD would later release it himself twice: first, in 2002, on his collaboration with DJ Honda, Underground Connection, and then again in 2003 on his third solo album The Awakening, both versions slightly altering Sermon’s timestamp of the year 2001 at the very beginning so as not to confuse listeners. It’s well worth tracking down, but I’m not marking it as a “B-Side” because that isn’t what really happened here. Anyway, now to end the review.

FINAL THOUGHTS: It’s surprising that Music ended up being so popular as an album, because it doesn’t do a single thing to introduce Erick Sermon to the masses: in fact, the project is so esoteric, relying on the listener’s past experience with Sermon, Def Squad, and EPMD, that it’s much more likely to turn heads away at the door who aren’t familiar with the man. Music is an album for the longtime fans only, which isn’t a bad thing, but for whatever reason Sermon uses this as an opportunity to coast, and the, um, music suffers as a result. The man simply took more chances on the Erick Onasis project: all of the beats on Music (including the one Rockwilder handled) sound like they had been recreated from other, better songs from our host’s past. That being said, Music isn’t an offensive album: most of this flies by in a flash, and while it doesn’t leave any imprint on your mind, it also doesn’t make one fill with rage like, say, a certain Max at Def Squad Presents Erick Onasis. In fact, you’ll likely find some of this enjoyable. But what we receive on Music is surface-level Erick Sermon, a Green Eyed Bandit so consumed with pleasing his corporate overlords (especially after the Marvin Gaye stunt worked out so well for him) that he turned in a spit-polished, shiny version of his Dreamworks effort, except with a couple of bigger-name guests, a perk of having access to Davis’ checkbook. An album can be completely inoffensive and still not entirely entertaining, though, which is the weird middle ground that Music currently occupies: it isn’t bad, but it also isn’t good or even okay, it just… is.

BUY OR BURN? I think a burn would be sufficient. There are only a handful of performances on Music that demand the attention of Erick Sermon historians or apologists anyway.

BEST TRACKS: “Now What’s Up”; “I’m That N---a”; LL Cool J’s verse on “Do-Re-Mi” (I wasn’t kidding, folks)

-Max

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