My Gut Reaction: Gang Starr - One Of The Best Yet (November 1, 2019)

To say that today’s topic is one that was unexpected is putting it kindly.

The saga of the duo Gang Starr, made up of producer DJ Premier and the late rapper Guru, was thought to have ended in 2003, when their sixth album The Ownerz was released. The Ownerz followed five projects that many hip hop heads hold in extremely high regard, over the course of which Premier became known as the go-to for a very highly specific New York boom bap sound (even though he hailed from Houston, Texas) while Guru’s matter-of-fact monotone captured the realities of street life as only someone from New York City, the birthplace of our chosen genre, could (even though he was from Boston – it’s weird how many people associate Gang Starr with the Big Apple, right?). But after The Ownerz dropped, Guru effectively disbanded the duo, moving on to a solo career with the help of a new friend, producer Solar.

Solar, the punk-ass bitch, drove a wedge between Guru and Premier, and the two never spoke to one another again. Guru then passed away in 2010, leaving a gap in the culture that has yet to be filled. Now it’s very highly likely that Guru and Preemo already had their issues (both are stubborn, hardheaded artists who clashed many times during their tenure), and Solar probably just exploited this knowledge to turn Guru against his former friend. I’ve seen it happen on many an occasion. The problem with Solar, the punk-ass bitch, is that he also turned Guru against his own family, isolating him until he had full control over the man’s career, even attempting to continue his maneuvering after Guru’s passing.

Which brings us to today's unexpected topic.

One Of The Best Yet is billed as Gang Starr’s seventh and final album, a surprise effort (for those who hadn’t followed DJ Premier’s interviews where he expressed an interest in doing one, anyway). It consists of unreleased Guru verses recorded after The Ownerz that were under Solar’s control until fairly recently, when a court ruled against the punk-ass bitch and handed control of Guru’s estate over to his family, who Preemo still had a relationship with. Sadly, the verses themselves apparently weren’t a part of the settlement, as Premier had to pay Solar (through an intermediary) for them: this has since resulted in Solar threatening to sue Premier for not listing him in any capacity in the liner notes, and also leaking a track or two of his own that feature the Guru vocals within their original contexts.

Fuck that guy, right? How has he never gotten his ass kicked by now? Especially in a world where Bumpy Knuckles exists?

Solar is the reason I never thought this moment would come, so the mere fact that One Of The Best Yet is an album that I just listened to, and it wasn’t a bootleg, is fucking amazing. Preemo’s been working on this project in secret for a few years now, so unlike other posthumous projects where a late artist’s verses, both old and new, are smashed together with updated instrumentals and too many guest cameos to count (see: The Notorious B.I.G.’s Born Again and Duets: The Final Chapter), One Of The Best Yet actually plays like a proper Gang Starr album, albeit a very short one. All of the beats are Preemo originals, and the guest list is rather limited, considering how many of your favorite artists would kill for the chance to appear on an album like this: outside of a few randos who DJ Premier felt would fit the vibe, the guest list features rappers who all had a working relationship with Guru and played a role in the come-up of the Gang Starr Foundation, which is the best possible way to do a project such as this.

My thoughts are scattered right now because I just listened to this album and want to talk about it, so here you go, you two.

1. THE SURE SHOT (INTRO)

A live performance chopped up in such a way so that Preemo can insert segments of old Gang Starr instrumentals in between Guru’s call-and-response, reminding the listener of the depth of the duo’s musical bench, the sheer amount of great work they had put into our chosen culture while the listener shakes their heads in disbelief, in a, “Wait, is this really happening right now? Am I listening to a new Gang Starr album in 2019?”-kind of way. That’s how it all worked out for me, anyway.

2. LIGHTS OUT (FEAT. M.O.P.)

Preemo kicks off One Of The Best Yet with a strong, menacing instrumental and a “hardheaded and angry” Guru, whose delivery on “Lights Out” doesn’t necessarily mimic that of the guests in the Mash Out Posse, but still sounds aggressive enough, if a tiny bit comical, since for the most part we’re used to hearing disaffected observations (due to his legendary monotone, which isn’t a critique) as opposed to open hostility, especially toward “star-struck bitches”. DJ Premier works Guru’s vocals in masterfully, though, even allowing pockets where we can all pretend that Lil’ Fame and Billy Danze were all in the studio with him when his lines were recorded. “Lights Out” is more of an M.O.P. showcase, however, as these two dudes who have past history with both Guru and Premier bring their A-game for their late friend and collaborator. Fizzy Womack, in particular, turns in the best verse, which may be blasphemous to say during a review for One Of The Best Yet, but it is what it is: he starts off with a goofy joke (“A wise man once said, ‘Fuck what a wise man said’!”) and builds to a sobering observation of his own (“When they can’t touch what you[‘ve] become, they’ll try to dig up who you used to be”). Danzini also turns in a solid verse. “Lights Out” bangs, and after Billy’s two recent solo EPS, it was nice to hear M.O.P. on the same page again.

3. BAD NAME

This second single is a bit perplexing: it’s titled “Bad Name” because that’s what Guru clearly says during the “hook”, but the Ed O.G. vocal sample Preemo mixes in has him saying, “I hate telling good people bad news.” Was DJ Premier just not able to find a clip that used the phrase “Bad Name” by his self-imposed deadline? It’s an odd disconnect that ultimately doesn’t derail the track (at least not as much as the recorded-over-the-phone sound quality of Guru’s (calm and collected) verses, anyway), but it still kinda bugs me. Anyway, “Bad Name” is also good: Preemo’s sweeping instrumental is reminiscent of his best work, and Guru’s verse, decrying the current state of hip hop, could have been released at any point during the last sixteen years and still be relevant and evergreen. I just wish his diatribe ran longer, but Preem only had what Solar bothered to sell to him, so.

4. HIT MAN (FEAT. Q-TIP)

Gang Starr and A Tribe Called Quest (who released their own brilliant posthumous (in regard to the late, great Phife Dawg) album, We Got It From Here… Thank You 4 Your Service, in 2016) were two early jazz-rap pioneers, so it’s strange that these guys had never collaborated before “Hit Man”, and honestly, they could have just kept this shit to themselves. The input from our hosts is just fine: Guru delivers two verses discussing the internal life of a hitman, whose emotions are so disconnected from his work that he can “smoke a n---a in the club, then dance right past n----s”, while Preemo’s instrumental is more simplistic boom bap than what we’ve received thus far, but still engaging as hell. But guest star Q-Tip’s contribution is hilariously awful. Maybe he was just so honored to have been asked to contribute to history that he just plain forgot to write something, you know, good, but Tip’s hook is mostly him making gunshot noises with his mouth like a low-rent Kendrick Lamar or the good folks at Griselda Records. Although I now want to hear Q-Tip alongside Conway the Machine and Westside Gunn, I didn’t need to have his “Hit Man” performance in my life, and I fucking love Q-Tip, so this was a tough critique for me to write. Sigh.

5. WHAT’S REAL (FEAT. GROUP HOME & ROYCE DA 5’9”)

The rap duo Group Home played a vital role during the early days of the Gang Starr Foundation, so I was happy to see them appear on One Of The Best Yet. Still, both members are terrible fucking rappers, and “What’s Real” features Preemo’s PRhyme partner Royce da 5’9”, who is still on my shortlist of best rappers alive, so he limits the contributions of both Lil’ Dap and Melachi the Nutcracker to the chorus, where they can do the least amount of damage. It seems that juggling all of these bowling pins took a lot out of DJ Premier, though, as the instrumental for “What’s Real” is merely “fine”. (Also, the hook is garbage: Dap and the Nutcracker still rap poorly, but now they just sound old on top of that.) But Guru and Royce sound fucking fantastic, with Guru spitting his matter-of-fact shit while Ryan Montgomery brings forward a contended for hottest verse of the goddamn year. Even though the final product is lacking, at least the actual verses are worth the effort. Also, the Q-Tip vocal sample that leads into Guru’s opening bars is one trillion percent better than his hook on “Hit Man”. Funny, that.

6. KEITH CASIM ELAM (INTERLUDE)

Guru’s son appearing on an interlude is sweet. Guru’s son sounding a lot like the man was unexpected, however.

7. FROM A DISTANCE (FEAT. JERU THE DAMAJA)

DJ Premier’s (rightfully) turning One Of The Best Yet into a greatest hits tour of sorts, bringing back all of the beloved guests who contributed memorable moments to Gang Starr’s legacy. First it was the Mash Out Posse, followed by Group Home, and on the Bette Midler Nanci Griffith cover “From a Distance” comes Jeru the fucking Damaja, who falls in lockstep with Preemo’s boom bap even though the two hadn’t had a working relationship since 1996. Even without all of the unearthed Guru verses, One Of The Best Yet is a crowning achievement in DJ Premier’s career just for all of the hatchets he’s managed to bury for the greater good. And by God, Jeru sounds good, or rather great, on “From a Distance”, talking his holier-than-thou shit with a shot of adrenaline while Guru’s verse runs circles around today’s more acclaimed artists. Premier’s beat, especially, plays like a 2019 upgrade to the sonics found on The Ownerz, which only adds to the illusion that Guru actually worked alongside him to craft One Of The Best Yet. God damn.

8. FAMILY AND LOYALTY (FEAT. J. COLE)

The first single, and the song that Preemo whipped the Interweb into a frenzy with, causing all hip hop heads from a certain era to go apeshit, myself included. And I say that even though I still hate J. Cole’s guest verse. I understand the reasoning behind bringing Jermaine into the proceedings (you have to get the kids on board, obviously), but his contribution is, as those same kids say, ass cheeks. His flow is fucking atrocious and is nothing like the Cole you’re likely familiar with. So it’s a good thing that the rest of “Family and Loyalty” is damn near perfect: Guru’s verses (and patched-together hook) fit Premier’s melodic boom bap like a glove, so much so that I assume it was very difficult for Premier to edit out Solar’s name from the first verse in favor of his own, just because a lot of the lines in that first verse could have been directed toward him during that portion of Guru’s post-breakup career that we’d all like to forget ever happened. This was the perfect way to introduce the very existence of One Of The Best Yet. One thing still annoys me, though: why the hell isn’t this just called “Diamonds”? Guru certainly says that word often enough.

9. GET TOGETHER (FEAT. NITTY SCOTT & NE-YO)

Guru is hardly a stranger to love and lust raps, and I give kudos to Preemo for trying to make One Of The Best Yet seem more well-rounded, playing as a legitimate album and not just the cobbled-together collection of unreleased verses it truly is. But even though “Get Together” ultimately doesn’t work, it’s still a historic achievement, as it marks the very first time a female emcee has appeared on a Gang Starr album. (Yes, The Lady of Rage popped up on a remix to “You Know My Steez”, but we’re talking official albums here.) Brooklyn rapper Nitty Scott delivers her verse as though she were responding to Guru’s come-ons in the studio, which was a nice touch, but altogether this track did nothing for me, from Guru’s tired player persona to Premier’s weird, but not fascinatingly so, beat. Le sigh. I somehow found guest crooner Ne-Yo’s hook to be both silly and entirely dismissive of an entire language, so.

10. NYG’Z / GS 183 RD (INTERLUDE)

Panchi (of the duo NYG’z, whose other half, Shiggy Sha, doesn’t appear here) works alongside DJ Premier on his Live From HeadQCourterz Sirius XM show, so obviously he’d be clued in about One Of The Best Yet as it was happening, and obviously Preem would see fit to involve him somehow,. This interlude was amusing, but was it really necessary?

11. SO MANY RAPPERS

A Guru solo effort that sounds pretty dated, what with the references to Chappelle’s Show, 106 & Park, and even Yo! MTV Raps. But I appreciated the man’s lyrical focus, eyeing fellow rappers who aren’t in the game for the right reasons, and I dug how DJ Premier kept altering the instrumental throughout, throwing together various elements haphazardly in a way that still somehow clicked. Not my favorite song on the album by a long shot (and “Bad Name” treads the exact same territory with much better execution), but it wasn’t bad.

12. BUSINESS OR ART (FEAT. TALIB KWELI)

Toward the end of his verse, guest star Talib Kweli says, “It’s Gang Starr with the Black Star gang,” which leads me to believe that Mos Def Yaasin Bey may have once been a part of “Business of Art”, a song contrasting the differing attitudes toward hip hop present in the title. I mean, it’s possible: Preemo has worked with Bey before, and his instrumental rolls by slowly, a tempo Kweli doesn’t excel at (although I have no doubt The Mighty Mos could fuck around and do something to it), and as a result the man sounds as awkward as he did on Mos Def & Talib Kweli are Black Star. Kweli’s verse is also very profane when compared to the squeaky-clean Guru performance, which was a choice. Guru sounds fine, however: his monotone was always easily adaptable for whatever dragon Preemo happened to be chasing that day. But “Business or Art” deserved a better guest. Yeah, I fucking said it.

13. BRING IT BACK HERE

A quickie one-verse wonder that Preemo likely couldn’t stretch into song form, “Bring It Back Here” features a Guru operating at, um, Daily Operation speed, issuing threats and boasts as naturally as breathing. I wish the drums hit a bit harder, but what we receive here still manages to knock it out of the park. That’s all I got.

14. ONE OF THE BEST YET (BIG SHUG INTERLUDE)

It’s only right to give the founding member of the Gang Starr Foundation his own audio track, given the significance of the project. But did he have to sing though.

15. TAKE FLIGHT (MILITIA, PT. 4) (FEAT. BIG SHUG & FREDDIE FOXXX)

One of the better developments in One Of The Best Yet existing is receiving the fourth entry in a song series long thought to be dormant, and it does. Not. Disappoint. Shit, my only real complaint about “Take Flight (Militia, Pt,. 4)” is how Freddie Foxxx/Bumpy Knuckles (with a knockout verse, albeit one not quite as compelling as his contribution on the joint that set all of this in motion, Moment of Truth’s “The Militia”) says, “Spit on your favorite song with verses crazy long / ‘Cause I do what the fuck I want on every song”, and then he sticks to just sixteen bars. What a fucking tease. Still, Shug and Bumpy spit their hearts out, clearly thrilled at this opportunity they never thought they’d ever receive, and a posthumous Guru makes his mark with goofy, violent bars that only add to the man’s arsenal. I hadn’t realized how much I missed this trio until today.

16. BLESS THE MIC

One Of The Best Yet ends with a Guru solo shot over what I found to be the best instrumental of the evening: Preemo provides moody, atmospheric boom bap that soundtracks Guru’s attempts at proving that hip hop is timeless, regardless of what the Sinbad sound bite at the beginning implies. It flies by rather quickly: my guess is that the two verses on “Bless The Mic” (along with the hook) were all once a part of a lengthier passage. But Preem helps the whole sound greater than the sum of its parts, and Guru’s bars (and mere voice, really) are enough for me to wish that this trip back down memory lane wasn’t already over. DJ Premier even caps the track with the Greg Nice sound bite from “DWYCK”) that was put into good use during the album intro, bringing this journey full circle.

THE LAST WORD: One Of The Best Yet has no business being as entertaining as it is. It’s a victory lap for the legacy of Guru and DJ Premier, one final chance to give the fans something to remember them by, which may be a morbid way of thinking about the still-with-us DJ Premier, but I have no doubt that he’s now satisfied with how this narrative has ended. Preemo took his time and worked Guru’s vocals in such a way that it’s easy to believe that their working relationship had never ended. True, we’ll never really know what could have been, but if One Of The Best Yet is even just a decent-enough facsimile, I’ll fucking take it.

Not every track works, but then again, not every track worked on every single other Gang Starr project, either. Nostalgia carries more than one song here over the finish line, but in this instance that’s not such a bad thing, as hearing Guru’s voice over a DJ Premier instrumental has a mystical, symbiotic quality, as though one shouldn’t exist without the other. Can you imagine “Mass Appeal” or “Above the Clouds” without Guru? No, you can’t, nor should you, and that’s how I feel about the songs featured on One Of The Best Yet, even the ones that didn’t work quite as well for me: these are Guru’s beats to lose, as Preemo crafted them for nobody but his former partner-in-crime. The fact that a lot of the songs bang is simply an entertaining bonus. “Lights Out” and “Take Flight (Militia, Pt. 4)” are Gang Starr at their antagonistic, shit-talking best, while “From A Distance”, “Bad Name”, “Bless The Mic”, and “Bring It Back Here” hint at what could have been if the group hadn’t broken up in 2004.

The guest appearances are mostly respectful, if a bit forgettable, unless you’re M.O.P., Jeru the Damaja, or Bumpy Knuckles, because your shit knocked, or if you’re Q-Tip, in which case I’ll just have a quizzical look on my face. I hated J. Cole on here, but I still respect the hustle and get that it was a huge honor for him just to have been offered the spot – if Preemo had offered me a spot on One Of The Best Yet, I’d have taken it, no question, even though I don’t rap. So I can’t really be upset at the parts that didn’t click for me.

One Of The Best Yet is possibly the best posthumous release in hip hop history (the Tribe album doesn't really count, since Phife was still alive to contribute his vocals), if only because Preemo wasn’t doing it as a cheap money-grab: the man took his time to give the listener what they hadn’t even realized they'd been missing until they first heard “Family and Loyalty”, and on behalf of the culture, we appreciate it. Go buy this fucking thing already.

-Max

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Never thought I’d get another opportunity to link to this, but: Catch up on the Gang Starr story by clicking here.