Originally from Grand Rapids, Michigan, born in the Bronx and raised in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, Lason "La the Darkman" Jackson grew up with some of the Wu-Tang members. As a teenager he signed his first contract and in 1998, barely twenty-year-old, he released his first LP. The cover has a black background and features the author's name at the top, title at the bottom, and the Wu-Tang logo in purple that appears to have eyes in the center. Production is primarily done by Carlos "Six July" Broady, covering over half the disc, while other beats are provided by 4th Disciple, the Wu-Tang Clan related producer who is part of Killarmy, RZA, Raekwon (credited as co-producer), DJ Muggs and Havoc, author of two beats. The guests of the record come mainly from the Wu-Tang Clan and answer the names of Raekwon, Masta Killa, U-God and Ghostface Killah, along with the Wu-affiliates Tekitha, Killa Sin of Killarmy, 12 O'Clock of Brooklyn Zu, and other guests such as Havoc, Maia Campbell, Puff, DJ Rogers and Shotti Screwface.
The album opens with a sample from the kung-fu movie "Five Deadly Venoms" (1978), establishing that this boy is a legitimate member of the Wu-Tang Clan. Production by Carlos "6 July" Broady, one of the beatmakers on the Puff Daddy's The Hitmen production team. Soul samples from Junior Mance's "I Believe to My Soul", dirty, dusty, harsh drum, honest bass, average generic delivery of La the Darkman spitting criminal thug bars. Simple hook, banal. The title means money. Three stanzas in this monotonous style are perhaps too many for him.
2. "Shine"
The LP didn't start well, the first cut is just decent, but the record quickly collapses on track number two, when 6 July decides it's time to set a mainstream beat to help sales. Roy Ayers sample from "Vittroni's Theme - King Is Dead", from the soundtrack of the blaxploitation film "Coffy" (1973) is good, many talented artists have built songs on it for some of their best albums. Nas in 1999 on "I Am..." for a track with DMX, Prodigy used it in a song made with Noreaga from his solo debut "H.N.I.C." (2000), Three 6 Mafia used it in a song with Boogie Mane for "Most Known Unknown" (2005), and above all, Lord Bean is probably the only one who managed to get a clean classic out of this piece, inventing "Street Opera" for Fritz da Cat's album "Novecinquanta" in 1999. The 6 July loop is useless here, surrounded by commercial sounds, the beat is intended for club, pop rap. La's lyricism is negligible, mixing materialism, crime, thugging, bragging and seedy bars, nothing really worth investigating.
3. "City Lights"
Solid beat provided by Havoc of Mobb Deep. Good bassline, thin, light downtempo drum, haunting loop from O'jays' "Family Reunion", sounds like one of Mobb Deep's b-side beats. The Darkman seizes the opportunity and drops street life lyrics that fit beautifully with the beat, unique verse in a robust crime narrative delivered with a fluid, smoothness flow: the guy is inspired in this track, he makes a good impression and comes back to create a good cut after the garbage that was the previous track.
4. "What Thugs Do" (ft. DJ Rogers & Puff)
The guest credited as Puff isn't Puff Daddy. Another club rhythm realized by 6 July, this LP is starting to feel like a joke. Ridiculous rhythm, the worst track on the record comes out also due to the few guests. The rapper is committing himself lyrically, but he can't work miracles to save this garbage.
5. "Heist of the Century" (ft. Killa Sin)
Great beat by DJ Muggs, elegant piano, midtempo dusty dirty drum, thick bassline in the background. Delivering back and forth between Killa Sin of Killarmy & La the Darkman, delivering short verses with great delivery style narrating a scary heist, the heist of the century, in particular the Staten Island emcee details the situation remarkably, while the lead rapper has a different style, well-done, but not on the level of Killa Sin.
6. "Fifth Disciple"
4th Disciple's underground rhythm, dusty bassline, dirty, dusty drum, downtempo, gloomy piano, dark samples, excellent rhythm. Beautiful. The Darkman delivers a single verse, this is one of the best beats on the entire record and ends after less than a minute, fading even as the rapper finishes his verse. Incredible.
7. "Now Y"
Good bass line, loud, rowdy, random drum, dark samples, this is one of the few decent beats on 6 July. The Darkman isn't really saying anything with his decent, regular, generic flow, but this choice is fine, it's honest.
8. "Spring Water" (ft. Raekwon)
The Darkman is inspired in this cut with Raekwon, the first to feature a guest directly from the Wu-Tang Clan on this LP, after eight tracks. Raekown's flow is smooth, excellent. End of the good news. The piece sucks, and the problem is with the production, again by 6 July, whose work here is awful. Raekwon is also sometimes credited as a producer on this track alongside Broady. The beat is pop rap, made for the club, with samples of "Heaven and Hell is on Earth" by 20th Century Steel Band and "Joy and Pain" by Maze, solid bass line, very little drum, bad, awful, samples not exactly good, the sound isn't what you expect from a hardcore record, forget this guy calls himself the twelfth member of the Wu-Tang Clan.
9. "4 Souls" (ft. Shotti Screwface)
This track boasts one of the few decent 6 July productions. Robust bassline, dry, sparse, heavy, midtempo drum, melodic samples from Aretha Franklin's "Land of Dreams". Here should have been someone from Wu destroying the beat, instead there's Shotti Screwface. Guys are fine for two minutes, but five of them are just too much.
10. "Street Life" (ft. Tekitha)
Fourth production in a row of Carlos Broady aka 6 July. The boy takes a sample from the homonymous song made by Crusaders ft. Randy Crawford almost twenty years earlier. Heavy bass, midtempo dusty drum, melodic samples, it should be one of the best songs, but Tekitha seems like she can't sing anymore, bad hook. The Darkman blesses the beat with three verses of gangsta rap, the track doesn't go down in history.
11. "Love" (ft. Maia Campbell)
4th Disciple returns behind the keyboards and makes a great beat with a Gladys Knight sample from "If I Were Your Woman". The Darkman decides to make an obligatory love rap song by writing a narrative about a girl. The track divides fans into those who think it's decent and those who think it's one of the worst disc choices in a hardcore effort. The rhythm holds up for two minutes, but not five.
12. "Figaro Chain" (ft. Havoc)
Robust Havoc soundscape, great bassline, downtempo drums, obscure samples. La hook, good rap from the Mobb Deep emcee, Darkman delivers the second verse, hook, outro, making one of the best cuts of his debut.
13. "Polluted Wisdom"
The track feels like an homage to Raekwon's album "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx..." from the moment La the Darkman opens referring to himself as Trafficante, a reference to the notorious Miami mob boss. Perfect rhythm by RZA, which takes two samples by OV Wright, "The Time We Have" and "A Fool Can't See the Light". OV Wright is one of the most sampled vocalists from the Wu-Elements. True Master used an OV Wright sample for a track from Cappadonna's debut album, Mathematics used one for his second CD and another for a Method Man & Redman track on their collaborative debut album. Bronze Nazareth also made use of the singer's songs to make Wisemen tracks. RZA used Wright samples for both instrumental tracks and album tracks by Wu-Tang Killa Beez, Killah Priest, by him, and for "America", song from the compilation "America Is Dying Slowly" (1996), made by the Wu-Tang Clan together with Killah Priest.
I thought that Bobby Steels had already used two OV Wright samples to create a track, and indeed this happens in "Motherless Child" from Ghostface Killah's debut, and one of the loops is taken from "A Fool Can't See the Light". Lively bassline in the background, dusty drum, midtempo, light, dirty violins, excellent rhythm. The Darkman delivers at his best on a soundscape that is among the finest on the record, narrating a girl who died of her own life of crime. The track is noteworthy because the boy is among the few who manages to create a real mafia cut, and in addition starring a girl, using some of the key elements in building a track of this hardcore subgenre: mafia lifestyle, luxury, getting money, crimes (robbery and murder, in this case), criminal narration and reference to a mafia figure (real or fictitious, in this case Scarface, protagonist of De Palma's film of the same name).
The track would have finished at three minutes, but it was decided to let the rhythm breathe for two minutes, it certainly deserved, it's a tradition of RZA's dope beats, but maybe not for two minutes. Outro, final sample from some movie.
14. "Gun Rule"
This seems to be the best rhythm of 6 July. Samples from "Don't Explain" by Grover Washington, Jr., fat, raw, thick bassline, hard, unforgiving, dry, midtempo, deadly drum, melodic samples, dark piano. Regular delivery of La the Darkman, inspired in this cut, finally on a production that looks decent, but it fades over time, second by second, unbelievable. 6 July manages to create a beat that gets worse with every passing minute and here are five of them. He engages it with a good street life rap and pays homage to the Wu-Tang by using a Carlton Fisk sample from Method Man's "Tical" for the hook of this track.
15. "Element of Surprise" (ft. Masta Killa & U-God)
Third production of 4th Disciple in this project, every presence of him in the record turns out to be a blessing. Killarmy's in-house producer invents one of the best beats on La the Darkman's debut album using a beautiful sample from Johnny Mathis' "Come to Me". Bare, tight, midtempo drum, cool violins, cool keyboards, good bassline in the background. Inspired, energetic, confident delivery by La the Darkman who is joined by two guests from the Wu-Tang Clan, Masta Killa and U-God. Master Killer tries to experiment and delivers a verse that rarely rhymes, but you might not even notice, because his flow is resounding, lucid, clean, fantastic. U-God spits hardcore with more energy than the previous emcee and rips the cut. The beat obviously deserved to breathe, but it doesn't. Undoubtedly one of the strongest joints in the project.
16. "Az the World Turnz" (ft. Raekwon)
Fourth and last beat produced by Wu-Element 4th Disciple, one of the best producers of the period. And here he proves once again why. Dark rhythm, vinyl crackle, piano scale, sax in background, dusty, thick, dirty drum, thick bass, dark piano keys. Beautiful production, probably the best on the album. The Darkman delivers in back and forth together with Raekwon, in his number two presence on the record, is the most present guest of the effort: the Wu-Tang Clan member isn't really engaging lyrically, but his flow keeps him going, he's in one of the best period of his career. Last verse left to La the Darkman, good flow, inspired, confident, energetic, elevated by excellent beat, breathing one minute to the end of the track.
17. "Wu-Blood Kin" (ft. 12 O'Clock & Ghostface Killah)
For the third consecutive track there's a Wu-Tang Clan guest on the record, this time it is Ghost Face Killer. Ridiculous rhythm of 6 July, this beat is the opposite of the previous one: fat bass, bad downtempo drum, rnb pop sounds, like a disco dance song, bad ballad. It's one of the worst beats on the record, absurd. Tony Starks exclusively performs the hook, the verses are performed by La the Darkman and 12 O'Clock, cousin of Ol' Dirty Bastard and member of Brooklyn Zu: the boys try to save the track, but the pacing is poor, weak, horrible, impossible to listen to this stuff even for less than three minutes. In the first half of the record you might start wondering what happened between La the Darkman and 6 July, what the former did to the latter, because the producer is providing him with some of his worst beats. And there was an Al Green sample here, crazy.
18. "I Want All"
Carlos "6 July" Broady disappoints, and what can he do but disappoint? This production is also tragically bad. Elegant piano scale, tight hard dry drum, thick bassline, generic samples. The Darkman closes the disc with an honest performance, weak hook. The ending of this disc is poor and bad, disappoints the listener after several high-level tracks made in collaboration with some artists of the Wu-Tang Clan.
Final Thoughts
The older brother of rapper Willie the Kid, La the Darkman is one of, if not the first, Wu-Tang affiliate to make his debut in the rap circuit on an album that is not by the group or any affiliate: he made his debut in 1996 on the Blahzay Blahzay album. He appears to have been a Wu affiliate since 1996, when he was a teenager, then his mother decided to move him from Brooklyn to Grand Rapids, Michigan, due to the troubles he was getting himself into in New York. Some Wu-Tang affiliates such as the Wisemen are also native of Gran Rapids. The following year, he's in "The Soul Assassin 1" by DJ Muggs and in 1998 he makes an appearance in the album of the affiliate group Deadly Venoms. According to some versions, it seems that the boy impressed the members of the Clan in the track "Devil in a Blue Dress" for DJ Muggs' album, and the Staten Island group recruited him in the Killa Beez.
In fact, the Darkman gets help from the Wu-Tang Clan that some of the members of the group themselves will not receive later, such as U-God and Inspectah Deck, who maybe have more or less the same amount of beats from the Wu-Elements, but certainly not the same quality, and they don't have as many guests from the group. Darkman combines them with material from producer 6 July of the Hitmen, Puff Daddy's production team, and also gives space to some friends, concentrating most of the Clan spots for the final section of the disc, which is unquestionably the strongest.
The production goes well most of the time and disappoints in many cases, due to the ridiculous contribution made by Carlos "6 July" Broady, which makes the whole project musically erratic, irregular and wobbly: for every good boom bap track with the Wu sound of the period, there's a horrible pop rap or club track with a bad beat, these tracks are sequenced one after another, and the bad track often has 6 July's name in the production credits. When 6 July arrives, the rapper is always at his worst, it can't be a coincidence. The lyrics provided by the author mainly revolve around common street topics, crimes, robberies, thugging, various threats, gangsterism, firearms, drugs, and so on, are all quite similar and repetitive in these seventy minutes. La the Darkman's rapping is quite generic on this CD, there's nothing that's going to surprise you, he's more inspired than usual at times, but his potential is ignited when he's joined by other guests, as he struggles more to shine in the solo tracks.
Overall, the record polarizes fans due to its gross inconsistency and excessively long listening time, some consider it one of the underrated classics in Wu-Tang Killa Beez's massive discography, some consider it rubbish. The truth in this case lies somewhere in between: the disc consists of 72 minutes made by inserting a great track and a weak track one after the other, making at least half of the album useless and difficult to listen to. As already explained by other fans and critics, it's tiring and exhausting to face this album in one listen, because it destroys you mentally and physically, it's absurd.
The disc is co-produced by Wu-Tang Records and Supreme Team and is distributed by Navarre, there's no precise data on copies sold. Some say it has sold three copies, others say it has sold at least three hundred thousand as an independent, the more optimistic report 400,000 units. Certainly the album hits the Billboard charts and ends up in the top 40 among hip-hop records, and two singles are taken from the CD, "Spring Water", for which the boy shoots a music video with Raekwon, and the title track. In any case, La the Darkman sells enough to be able to afford to start his own label and establish his own independent career in the industry.
Highlights: "Lucci", "City Lights", "Heist of the Century", "Figaro Chain", "Polluted Wisdom", "Element of Surprise", "Az the World Turnz".
Rating: 7/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment