The Greatest Wu Solo Albums

The Wu-Tang Clan is probably one of the greatest hip-hop groups of all-time and when they entered the hip-hop scene in 1993, the nine man collective changed the face of hip-hop.  The group released their debut album, Enter the Wu-Tang: 36 Chambers, in November 1993 on Loud Records and at the time, the group’s contract with Loud Records was considered unique because it allowed the individual group members sign solo deals with other record labels.  As a result, a year after the release of their debut album, Method Man would be the first of the individual members to release his solo album Tical, and multiple members would follow.  What follows is my list of the top 5 Wu solo albums.  Remember this is my list, not your list, so if you disagree, give me your top 5.

#5 Method Man – Tical

 I know a few people that didn’t like this album.  One of my boys hated the album so much that he was going to return it to Camelot Music and he said if they didn’t take, he was going to throw it at them and tell them to keep it.  Another one of my boys said he was never buying another Wu solo album, even though he changed his mind when Ol’ Dirty dropped his album next.  Call me sentimental though because the album holds a special place in my heart as being the first Wu solo album.  I also thought it epitomized the griminess that Wu-Tang represented at that time with the dark, hard beats of songs such as Bring The Pain, P.L.O. Style and Mr. Sandman.

#4 Ghostface Killah – Ironman

Most Wu fans should know this, but the original pressing of this album included a joint called The Soul Controller, but due to sample issues, the song was removed from later pressings.  I actually had the original pressing, but the CD got scratched and then I lucked up and found it in a used CD shop for dirt cheap. 

#3 GZA – Liquid Swords

I believe this was the fourth solo album from the Wu and it came out in November 1995.  It was my freshman year of college and I didn’t have a car, so my boy Shun who was at Michigan State, copped it for me and sent it to me.  I remember the back cover telling a story with the song titles, but nowhere in the CD were the song titles in order, so you had to guess the title of the songs.  In my opinion, GZA is probably the dopest lyricist in the Wu and while I think most people appreciate the album, I don’t think it gets its proper respect.  On some days, I could probably put this album at #2 on the list.

#2 Ghostface Killah – Supreme Clientele

Out of the sophomore solo albums from the Wu, this is easily the dopest one.  It came out in January of 2000 and I remember it spent the entire semester in my Walkman.  I can still put this album on today and play it straight through.  I love this album.  If it were a woman, I’d probably waive my “only marry Oprah” rule.  I think Ghost probably has the best solo catalog among the Wu and this album is the crown jewel.  This album is one of my favorites of all-time and if you call yourself a Wu fan and don’t have this album in your top 5, you might want to reconsider giving yourself the title of a Wu fan.

#1 Raekwon – Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… 

The purple tape.  This album came out August 1, 1995.  Up to this point, we had gotten solo albums from Meth and Ol’ Dirty which were both dope, but this album, it changed hip-hop.  I consider it the apex of Mafioso rap.  I still remember when I got this album.  I rode down to the mall with my mom to cop the album from Camelot Music and then I went to the laundry mat with her.  In the ride over, I remember ripping off the packaging and reading the tracklisting on the back of the CD.  The Wu members had given themselves Wu-Gambino names and I was studying the back of the album cover trying to learn their Wu-Gambino names.  While this was Rae’s solo album, it was billed as Raekwon the Chef guest starring Ghostface Killah, so it was almost like a group album.  This album also featured one of Nas’ best verses on Verbal Intercourse and it also featured the interlude Shark N****s where Rae and Ghost took shots at Biggie by accusing him of biting Nas’ album cover.  A couple of Christmases ago, I began giving my acknowledged nieces and nephews a classic album and I love this album so much that this was the album that I gave them last year. 

***Picture of album covers from www.amazon.com***

Arsenio and Hip-Hop

From http://blogs.houstonpress.com/rocks/ArseSnoop%200213.jpg

When I was younger, around my junior high and high school years, hip-hop was my life.  I spent my hard earned money on tapes and tried to watch every show that my favorite rappers were on.  I had stacks of VHS tapes that I had recorded countless videos and television appearances on.  Besides the music videos, I loved seeing my favorite rappers perform on shows like Yo! MTV Raps, Soul Train, In Living Color and any other show they popped up on.  This was before hip-hop went mainstream, so there weren’t a lot of shows for rappers to appear on like there is today.  This was especially true for the late night shows, but that all changed in 1989 when The Arsenio Hall Show hit the airwaves.

The Arsenio Hall Show only lasted for five years, but those five years were the bulk of my junior high and high school years, so it felt like a lifetime to me.  Before The Arsenio Hall Show came on the air, there wasn’t a late night talk show for rappers to appear on, but Arsenio had no problem embracing rappers and the hip-hop community.  During his first run Arsenio would give a host of rappers a chance to shine such as 2Pac, Queen Latifah, Snoop and Pete Rock and CL Smooth.  I was checking out TV.com (click here) for some of his past guests and he had a lot of entertainers on before they got big and the list isn’t limited to just rappers.  Jamie Foxx and Chris Rock both appeared when they were in the early stages of their careers and there’s a ridiculous amount of NBA stars that appeared on the show that probably wouldn’t have appeared on any other late night show.  He also had Christian Laettner on his show and I’m not sure why he would have a Duke player on his show.  I considered nixing this blog post after I found this out, but I’m going to take the stance that the positives outweigh the negatives.  Anyway, I have no idea why I woke up thinking about the original Arsenio Hall Show this morning, but as a tribute, I’m going to give you five of the most memorable performances from rappers.

2Pac – I Get Around

Pac was actually on Arsenio twice as a solo artist from what I remember.  He also performed Pain from the Above the Rim soundtrack which is probably my favorite Pac song of all-time, but most of the videos were really poor quality, so y'all get I Get Around which was still dope.

Snoop Doggy Dogg – Tha Shiznit

This is probably from late ’93 or early ’94.  I swear this was on like a Friday night and I remember waiting all night for Arsenio to come on.  I might be confused, but I believe Snoop performed What’s My Name? first and then Arsenio brought him back out to do Tha Shiznit.  I remember I had this on a VHS tape and I taped over it by mistake.  I still cry on the inside about it, but luckily we have YouTube now.

A Tribe Called Quest and Leaders of the New School – Scenario

I feel like this shouldn’t even need an introduction.  I mean this is Scenario, probably one of the dopest posse cuts of all-time and they performed it on Arsenio.

N.W.A. – 100 Miles and Runnin’

This video is longer because it includes an interview with N.W.A. before they performed.  This performance is significant because I can’t think of any other late night TV show host that would’ve had N.W.A. on their show in 1990.  There was controversy over the group name and lyrics and they even got the attention of the FBI.  However, that didn’t stop Arsenio from bringing the group on his show and giving them a platform to express themselves.

Hip-Hop for Arsenio

This was from Arsenio’s last show in 1994.  I remember watching this episode and I probably have it on VHS tape somewhere in my mom’s house.  He’s doing his opening monologue and the curtain lifts up and a bunch of rappers come out to pay tribute to Arsenio.  Yo-Yo and MC Lyte start it off followed by the likes of A Tribe Called Quest, Guru, CL Smooth and KRS-One.  It was a fitting tribute to a man who gave a voice to the hip-hop community for five years on the late night talk show circuit.

Who Killed Hip-Hop?

In 2009, Joe Budden released a song in three parts titled Who Killed Hip-Hop?  In the song he mentioned a number of culprits such as T-Pain with auto-tune, Master P with the ugly album covers or when we first heard Mims.  I’m not sure of what the reason is, but I’ve decided to start a series where every now and then, I’ll focus on someone or something that killed hip-hop.  Sometimes I’ll be serious and sometimes I’ll say it in jest, but you know the saying, “Many a true word is spoken in jest”.  So, without further ado, the first person to ruin hip-hop is:

Rohan Marley

Obtained from http://cdn.urbanislandz.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/rohan-marley-and-lauryn-hill-pic.jpg

In the summer of 1996, Rohan Marley met a young woman by the name of Lauryn Hill.  Lauryn was the member of a hip-hop group named the Fugees who had released their second album, The Score in February of 1996 (the same day as 2Pac’s All Eyez On Me coincidentally).  The album was a commercial success selling 6 million albums and winning a Grammy for Rap Album of the Year.  Lauryn Hill was the obvious star of the group.  She could rap and sing and she gained respect from hip-hop fans for her lyrical prowess.  Lauryn Hill was not only respected as a female lyricist, but as a lyricist period regardless of gender and it appeared she was destined for greatness.  Young Rohan and Lauryn would fall in love and exchange love faces and make a baby whose name would be Zion.

In 1998, Lauryn would release her critically acclaimed solo debut album The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.  The album would go on to sell 18 millions worldwide and she won 5 Grammy Awards including Album of the Year.  Although she sung on a majority of the album, many still felt that she was a hip-hop artist.  This album was supposed to be the beginning of Lauryn’s reign.  She was poised to not only be the best female emcee of all-time, but one of the greatest emcees of all-time regardless of gender, but then…life would strike.

Now, I’m not going to act like an expert on what happened with Lauryn after the release of her first album.  There’ll be links at the end of this blog to her Wikipedia page and you’re welcome to read those for further insight.  All I know is that Lauryn was apparently madly in love with Rohan Marley and they started making more kids and by 2001 she was pregnant with her third child and performed a taping for MTV Unplugged that was later released in 2002.  I saw this Unplugged performance and I have no idea what I was watching.  It was like watching the beginnings of a breakdown.  She didn’t perform any of her previous songs.  It was a performance of only new material and she was playing the guitar and it was obvious that she still needed to take lessons.  I felt like I was watching a car accident and I couldn’t turn away from it.

Since her Unplugged appearance, Lauryn has been out of the public spotlight for most of the past decade.  She’s popped up a few times.  There was the short-lived Fugees reunion that resulted in an appearance in Dave Chappelle’s Block Party, the appearances in court for tax evasion and I believe she’s shown up for a few concerts such as some tour dates for the Rock the Bells series a few years ago.  Besides that, Lauryn has been absent from public view and for me, the only reason I can come up with is that she fell in love and decided to start a family. 

Obtained from http://marchingcentral.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/lauryn.jpg?w=585

I know it’s selfish of me to be mad at Lauryn Hill for wanting to start a family.  She doesn’t owe a thing to anybody including me, but she could’ve been one of the best.  Lauryn could have paved the way for female emcees to be respected as lyricists.  Instead, we got the likes of Lil Kim, Foxy Brown and Trina to be the mainstream representatives of female emcees in hip-hop.  I can’t help but feel that if Lauryn hadn’t feel in love with Rohan and had reached her full potential, she could’ve have changed the way that female emcees are viewed.  Female emcees such as Rah Digga, Bahamadia or Jean Grae might’ve gotten more respect from the masses because Lauryn Hill would’ve paved the way for fans to respect females as lyricists. 

So that’s why I blame Rohan Marley for killing hip-hop.  He could’ve got with any other woman and made her fall in love and go crazy.  Why did he have to choose Lauryn Hill?  What did hip-hop ever do to him that he had to make our shining star go crazy?  Why Rohan?  Why?

Happy Valentine's Day!!!!!

A lot of people that know me would accuse me of not having a romantic bone in my body or being incapable of love.  I’m actually ok with that description and I do my best to embrace it.  However, just because my heart is an icebox, it doesn’t mean that I can’t still give out some music advice as we approach Valentine’s Day.  So, for all you guys out there looking to bring the hip-hop purist out of your lady, put the following playlist together and she’ll be putty in your hands. 

Method Man – All I Need (Original Version)

You’re tempted to replace it with the remix featuring Mary J., but don’t, you’re trying to bring the hip-hop purist out of your girl.  You need the grimy version.

Pharcyde – Passing Me By

MC Lyte – Poor Georgie

It’s not only a love song, but a PSA for drunk driving…Poor Georgie indeed.

Mos Def – Ms. Fat Booty

Ghostface – Camay

For that grown woman in your life that makes baked macaroni and turkey wings.

Lost Boyz – Renee

J. Cole – Dreams

If she has a man, this will persuade her to leave him for you.

UGK & Outkast – International Player’s Anthem

Notorious B.I.G. – One More Chance (Original)

Refer to the comments on Meth’s All I Need.  You need the grimy version.

Goodie Mob – Beautiful Skin

The sentimental moment of the mixtape.

Dogg Pound – Let’s Play House

Outkast – We Luv Deez Hoez

Don’t focus on the misogynistic word.  Focus on that they luv you despite the weave and fake nails.

2Pac – How Do U Want It

Naughty By Nature – O.P.P.

This is for the couples like Will and Jada.

Little Brother – Slow It Down

Mobb Deep – Shook Ones Pt. II

This joint is to mixtapes what ranch dressing is to food, it goes with anything!

Andre 3000 – Happy Valentine’s Day