Ultramagnetic MC's - Funk Your Head Up (March 17, 1992)

After releasing their debut album, Critical Beatdown, on Next Plateau Records in 1988, the Ultramagnetic MC's, made up of Kool Keith, Ced Gee, Moe Love, and TR Love, were awash in critical acclaim. They quickly started up work on a second album, but then apparently broke up, leaving their work incomplete and unreleased (until much later, anyway). In 1992, they reunited, signed up with a new label (Mercury Records), and set about recording a brand new second album, Funk Your Head Up.

The direction they were given by the label was to make Critical Beatdown 2, essentially. As the crew had already done a Critical Beatdown, they opted to do the exact opposite, recording subliminal disses and street anthems to funkier beats (which were still heavily reliant on multiple layers of samples). Unlike with the crew's experience with their last record label, Mercury Records granted them no creative control: in fact, once the album was complete, the label took the masters and had them remixed by outside producers and engineers, so that the sound would appeal to a more mainstream audience. As a result, Funk Your Head Up is technically an Untramagnetic MC's album, but the version we have is not the one that was intended to be heard.

The release was universally panned: thanks to the label's interference, Funk Your Head Up sounded almost nothing like what people actually wanted to hear Ultra perform. The only hit single spawned from a remix of an album track, "Poppa Large", which was not included on the official release (way to drop the ball there, Mercury). After leaving their fans wanting more for four years, the Ultramagnetic MC's found themselves losing their audience, and although the record has seen a retroactive spike in activity, there's no way to hide the fact that it was a disappointment on every level.

But how bad could it possibly be?

1. INTRODUCTION TO THE FUNK
"The most funkiest album ever made in the galaxy"? I'll be the judge of that.

2. INTRO
A rap album intro immediately following another rap album intro? I think my head just exploded. Kool Keith's brand pimping of the Ultramagnetic name is pretty funny, though.

3. M.C. CHAMPION
Considering that both Keith and Ced Gee rhyme on this track, shouldn't the song title be presented in its plural form? It's not like it's ever really explained that they're supposed to compete with each other, either. Aside from those ridiculous comments, the song itself is alright, but not memorable.

4. GO 4 YOURS
Keith sounds aggressive as hell during the song's intro, but then comes off as if he's on some sort of medication when his verse starts. There's a lot going on with the multi-layered beat, but as I didn't like the music very much, I didn't bother trying to analyze it.

5. BLAST FROM THE PAST
I thought this interlude was interesting, since it plays short clips from a bunch of the Critical Beatdown tracks, but unfortunately, it draws attention to the fact that, so far, the debut disc sounds better. Funk Your Head Up is nowhere near complete, though, so there's plenty of time for me to possibly change my mind.

6. FUNK RADIO
This song is pretty awesome, and TR Love, who did not appear anywhere on Critical Beatdown other than on the album cover, sounds pretty decent himself. But this is ultimately Kool Keith's song: insulting somebody by calling them a "small cauliflower" is pretty inspired.

7. MESSAGE FROM THE BOSS
I didn't care for this song.

8. PLUCKIN' CARDS
This Kool Keith solo offering is notable for dissing pretty much every other rapper in existence, both symbolically and blatantly. A lot of diss tracks seem to have derived from the blueprint Keith laid out, so on that note alone, this song is pretty good. You're prevented from becoming fully engaged, though, by the beat, which is just much too much.

9. INTERMISSION
Plays out exactly as it reads.

10. STOP JOCKIN' ME
"You played yourself like a big time toy from Mattel"? That's a pretty obtuse insult. I actually really liked this track, and the chorus is fucking hilarious to boot.

11. DOLLY AND THE RAT TRAP
More of an incomplete thought than the Kool Keith solo track it's supposed to be, but it sounds okay.

12. THE OLD SCHOOL
Skit...

13. BUST THE FACTS
Not bad, but not great.

14. MURDER AND HOMICIDE
Skit...

15. YOU AIN'T REAL
The lyrics were passable, but I couldn't get past what is supposed to be the "hook".

16. MAKE IT HAPPEN
Sounds the most like a Critical Beatdown leftover than anything presented so far, but I mean that in the best possible way.

17. I LIKE YOUR STYLE
The singing on the hook worked on "Stop Jockin' Me", as that song was already ridiculous to begin with, but this hook sounds like the generic love rap that most artists feel compelled to add to their albums to attract the female demographic. Walk on by, my two readers.

18. BILINGUAL TEACHINGS
Skit...

19. POPPA LARGE
Good, but really really short. Followers of Kool Keith may be more accustomed to the "Poppa Large" remixes (both East and West Coast variations), but if you're intrigued, here's the original. The remixes (specifically the East Coast one by Da Beatminerz) are heavily preferred, though.

20. MOE LOVE ON THE 1 AND 2
An altogether pleasant deejay cut, which serves as a pretty good interlude.

21. PORNO STAR (FEAT TIM DOG)
Keith's contribution sounds like a precursor to essentially every solo album he has ever released, thanks to his well-documented obsession with pornography. TR Love is downright embarrassing, but special guest star Tim Dog somehow manages to sound like a halfway decent rapper. I'm not sure how that happened, but it doesn't matter, as the song still sucks.

22. THE P.R.M.C. ID
Skit...

23. CHORUS LINE PT. 2 (FEAT TIM DOG)
I know that a lot of hip hop fans may consider this to be an Ultra classic, but I didn't care for it at all. And Tim Dog went right back to sucking. So, at least all is right with the world once again.

FINAL THOUGHTS: Funk Your Head Up is much darker than its predecessor, but it definitely didn't need to be, since the themes presented are exactly the same as what was discussed on Critical Beatdown. Kool Keith Thornton is still very much the star of the crew, a fact made that much more apparent with the inclusion of a third rapper, TR Love, whose function seems to be to make sure Keith sounds good on every song (Ced Gee manages to do well for himself, though). Beat-wise, it doesn't really matter, as we'll never get the opportunity to ever hear what the songs were supposed to sound like, but at least a handful of instrumentals take some rewarding chances, making some of the songs entertaining as hell. However, as a whole, this second group effort comes nowhere near the levels that Critical Beatdown reached. At twenty-three tracks deep, it's way too long for a listener from today's audience to invest their time into.

BUY OR BURN? As this title is out of print, you're not going to find it in stores anyway, but I don't think you should bother to burn this album either, unless you're either the world's biggest Kool Keith fan (in which case you'd already own this fucking thing) or just a collector of bad sophomore efforts. The Ultramagnetic MC's crawl too far up their own collective ass for the music to be consistently enjoyable, and the label's interference clearly didn't do them any favors.

BEST TRACKS: "Poppa Large"; "Stop Jockin' Me"; "Make It Happen"; "Funk Radio"

-Max

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Ultramagnetic MC's - Critical Beatdown

Ultramagnetic MC's - Critical Beatdown (October 4, 1988)

Critical Beatdown, from the Ultramagnetic MC's, is considered to be one of the greatest contributions to the genre we know and love. Newer hip hop fans may wonder how an album that only sold modestly can be considered one of the best ever, especially since nobody ever plays this shit in the South. The answer is best summed up in the following paragraphs.

The Ultramagnetic MC's are a New York-based rap collective made up of TR Love, Moe Love, Ced Gee, and perhaps the biggest name in subversive hip hop, Kool Keith. The crew formed in 1984 and released numerous 12-inch singles that found themselves in many a deejay's milk crates: their debut album, Critical Beatdown, was released by Next Plateau in 1988. The crew succeeded off of the strength of Kool Keith's unorthodox rhymes and Ced Gee's production techniques, which were pretty fucking revolutionary: his instrumentals were usually heavily layered with samples that were chopped up (not beyond recognition, but still) and re-ordered so as to produce a brand new variation on the existing source material, a tactic that turned heads in the late 1980's and would grow to be the standard, until the beginning of the sample wars, which made producing songs in this manner much too fucking expensive for the average low-budget record label to afford.

Thanks to the borderline-ridiculous imagery provided by Kool Keith's rhymes, combined with the normal-by-comparison skills of Ced Gee (the other primary rapper in the crew), the Ultramagnetic MC's became known for their eccentric rhyme patterns and their penchant for not really paying much attention to where the beat was at any point in time. They used this skill set to their advantage, dissing multiple rappers (primarily for the sport of it, not out of any perceived beef) in ways that it took literally years for fans to decipher.

Kool Keith is best known today for his many rap personas, his (fictional) stay in Bellevue, and his horrible hooks and beats on his multiple solo projects (unless said beats are provided by a professional, such as The Automator, Kutmaster Kurt, or Ced Gee), but Critical Beatdown showcases a possible budding genius at work, one getting the feel of his surroundings while pushing the limits of what hip hop heads will actually want to hear before tuning out completely. Its beats are also a breath of refreshing air, especially after being assaulted by overproduced club "bangers" by what passes for the radio these days.

But the real reason Critical Beatdown plays such an important role in hip hop history?

For me, it would have to be Kool Keith's hat on the album cover.

1. WATCH ME NOW
It's telling that Kool Keith is the first rapper you hear on Critical Beatdown. His voice stands out immediately, and you find yourself looking forward to whatever the hell he has to say (probably less so now, but he still has his moments), but Ced Gee actually has the best verse: he wins the belt after admitting that he sometimes rhymes off-beat (and awkwardly) on purpose. Is that a mild Run-DMC diss?

2. EASE BACK
Some good old fake-ass Public Enemy-type shit (thanks to the use of the same sample P.E. freaked for their "Terminator X To The Edge Of Panic"), although it does actually work, so I can't really criticize it that much. Although the comparison between the two crews would make Kool Keith the Flavor Flav, based on the voice alone, and it's not like you can even put those two guys in the same universe.

3. EGO TRIPPIN'
I wasn't really feeling Ced Gee on this beat, but that's probably because Kool Keith contributed a remake on that Sway & King Tech This Or That album, and Motion Man kept up with Keith impressively. Still, not bad.

4. MOE LUV'S THEME
Sorry, instrumental fiends: this is actually a Kool Keith solo song. However, since nobody actually writes songs about their deejay anymore, it's much appreciated.

5. KOOL KEITH HOUSING THINGS
You may recall that house music was actually bigger than hip hop at one point in time, so a lot of rappers tried to expand their sound (and their audience) by branching out a bit. This solo Keith cut won't change your perception of house music, but you'll probably still like it. I do, anyway.

6. TRAVELLING AT THE SPEED OF THOUGHT (REMIX)
This track is so incredibly fucking short, it'll leave you wanting for more.

7. FEELIN' IT
I wasn't.

8. ONE MINUTE LESS
I didn't care much for this track. Sorry, not all of these critiques are going to be book-length.

9. AIN'T IT GOOD TO YOU
Meh.

10. FUNKY (REMIX)
Pretty damn good, but I was left hoping that the group would use more of that Joe Cocker "Woman To Woman" sample that also made up the bulk of Dr. Dre's beat for 2Pac's "California Love" (the original version, not its inferior remix).

11. GIVE THE DRUMMER SOME
The late Paul C. (an engineer and producer who was tragically murdered the year after Critical Beatdown was released) provides the beat for Kool Keith to start spitting some wildly random shit. This song is best known as the track that The Prodigy (not the guy from Mobb Deep) cribbed from on their classic "Smack My Bitch Up" (yeah, that's right, I called it a classic), but the source material is pretty fucking good as well.

12. BREAK NORTH
Loving this beat. Ced Gee sounds more comfortable than Kool Keith on here, but if you want to get technical, Keith tends to sound awkward on every single song that he has ever done: however, that would be part of the charm.

13. CRITICAL BEATDOWN
I don't even remember any of Keith's lyrics, since Ced Gee dominates this motherfucker, with boasts that run the gamut from "Your girl wanna swallow me" to "You should've been a Muppet". Hi-larious!

14. WHEN I BURN
This beat is just awesome. The song flies by a bit too quickly for my tastes, though: I could have used an extra seventeen minutes of this shit.

15. CED-GEE (DELTA FORCE ONE)
This beat also rocks. Ultimately, though, the song is only alright, although Ced Gee gives it his best shot.

FINAL THOUGHTS: AN album called Critical Beatdown is already essentially impervious to any sort of criticism, but I'll give it a shot anyway. This album works a lot better if you perceive it as a collection of songs rather than a cohesive album, since every single song has an infectiously high energy level that doesn't let up, even though the subject matter on each song is exactly the same. Also, the rhymes of Kool Keith and Ced Gee sound damn near flammable over every single one of these beats: the combination of these factors makes an already-short album seem like it ends in roughly ten fucking minutes. And even though Ced Gee gets a couple of tracks to himself, Kool Keith makes a convincing argument for being the star attraction.

BUY OR BURN? Keith Thornton may not have been in his full-on hip hop weirdo mode yet, but you can hear the train a-coming on Critical Beatdown. As such, Kool Keith's fans should snatch this shit up with the quickness, a recommendation I would also make for fans of old-school hip hop and beats with multiple layers of samples (the likes of which you will never hear again, thanks to sample clearance laws). Everybody else should be warned that the Ultramagnetic MC's are an acquired taste, although this is clearly more accessible that, say, Dr. Octagonecologyst. (Note: A deluxe edition of Critical Beatdown, which includes multiple bonus tracks and a longer version of "Ego Trippin'" replacing the album version reviewed above, is probably more readily available than the original album, and will make a very nice addition to your CD collection.)

BEST TRACKS: "Give The Drummer Some"; "Moe Luv's Theme"; "Kool Keith Housing Things"; "Critical Beatdown"; "When I Burn"

-Max