In late 1998, Robert "RZA" Diggs completed his five-year plan to take his group, the Wu-Tang Clan, to the top of the music industry, and retired from music to focus on his career as a film director. He still has time for some hip-hop and, a little over a year after the supergroup's second album, he releases his debut solo studio album. Production is done almost entirely by RZA, while Inspectah Deck and King Tech have a rhythm each. The guests, mostly uncredited, are members of Wu-Tang Clan Method Man, Ol' Dirty Bastard, Masta Killa and Ghostface Killah, members of Killarmy PR Terrorist, Killa Sin, Islord, Baretta Nine and 9th Prince, members of Black Knights Holocaust and Doc Doom (aka Dr. Doom), Timbo King of Royal Fam, Ras Kass, affiliated singers Tekitha, Jamie Sommers and Ms. Roxy, and spoken-word singers and performers Force MD's, Frank "Foxy" Niedlich, Lisa I'Anson, Angel Cake, Victorie Heathcole and Lorenza Calamanderi.
Crazy intro in German, nonsense, from the second number one you understand that something isn't working in here and that this record will go from bad to worse.
2. "B.O.B.B.Y."
Track number two: the record just goes from bad to worse. RZA delivers one of the most cumbersome and ugly hooks of the year, then spits out random bars with an inspired, hardcore, energetic, yet still messy and effortless style. Three rough verses on a production that is not at his best: lively and hard drum, heavy and pounding, decent samples of random strings, at the end of the song, he lets the beat flow for a minute and a half, bringing it to five and a half minutes. It's not a good beat, so there's no point in letting it go.
3. "Unspoken Word"
This is the third track and it's as exhausting as the previous one: Bobby Steels' production is nervous, annoying and tight drum, pounding and metallic, to which is joined a mediocre chopped and looped chipmunk soul sample. Prince Rakeem structures the piece in a curious way: intro, hook, verse, bridge, verse, hook, bridge, verse, hook, bridge, hook, bridge, outro. It's incredibly tiring, because the guy never manages to entertain the listener after the two minutes: usually, the first verse is fine, but after the second the attention starts to wane, with the guy starting to deliver his random words with an increasingly bland, slow, average, weakly hardcore rapping.
4. "Slow Grind African"
The second of a series of useless skits in a foreign language follows, Lisa I'Anson performs in a dialect of Ghana on a tribal rhythm.
5. "Airwaves"
Track number five tries to attract Wu-Tang's loyal listeners with a sample from "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'", a masterpiece of "36 Chambers". I's one of the latest solo cuts of RZA and the performance is credited to his alter ego Bobby Digital: single verse in rap, light-hearted, slow, smooth, completely dominated by the rhythm, horrible mixing here, thanks to King Tech, who is also the producer of the song. This is one of two tracks not produced by RZA, the other being made by Inspectah Deck later. The drum is messy and noisy, cheap and bad, the sounds that the producer has placed are random and chaotic, practically nothing is understood of what the rapper is spitting, which perhaps works in his favor.
6. "Love Jones"
Angel Cake performs a short skit and slowcore pop-rnb hook for "Love Jones", a ballad in which Steels provides two verses with a slow, bland style. The rhythm is good, with downtempo dry drum, rattles, and an elegant and slow piano sample combined with another digital-electronic sample, nevertheless, the performance of RZA is poor, sparse, soporific.
7. "N.Y.C. Everything" (ft. Method Man)
This is the first real track of the album: boom bap, dirty dusty drum, messy and noisy, honest sample. Poor hook by RZArecta, hardcore, inspired and confident delivery of the same MC, then comes the first guest rapper of the edition, The Method Man, and the record makes a decisive turn: Johnny Blaze delivers with a smoothness, raw, effortlessly fluid style, bringing out a dope flow with which he vaporizes the other performer, closing with an outro that is actually a better hook than the one provided by Bobby Steels.
8. "Mantis" (ft. Masta Killa and Tekitha)
The eight piece is supposed to be another classic, instead, it's completely ruined by the beatmaker. Skit from "Invincible Shaolin" (1978), noisy and annoying drum, tight and pounding, mediocre sounds, easygoing delivery of The Abbot. There are digital sounds all the time and they're a nuisance hard to describe. Tekitha does the hook in rap, and she's better than RZA's entire career as a rapper, but the guy places those damn digital sounds all the time ruining the girl's performance as well. Masta Killa has the task of closing the song, he has a slow, decent, fluid style, however, even his contribution is almost completely ruined by other random digital sounds, the whole cut is to be thrown away.
9. "Slow Grind French"
Another skit, this time in French, performed by Victorie Heathcole on an honest piano loop, then it follows choice number ten.
10. Holocaust (Silkworm) (ft. Ghostface Killah, Holocaust, Dr. Doom and Ms. Roxy)
This song is a great Wu-Tang posse with affiliates Black Knights Holocaust and Dr. Doom, Ms. Roxy and Ghostface Killah: poor and rusty drum, old, decent-good samples, intro sung by Ms. Roxy and spoken by Holocaust, who's the first rapper to enter. This emcee plays the part of GZA, enters stronger than everyone and kills the cut immediately with a crazy verse, unattainable for all: his flow is orderly and smoothness, raw and confident, completely inspired, dope. RZA's random interlude, Ms. Roxy's bewitching chant, it follows Bobby Digital's messy, raw, hardcore delivery that precedes Dr. Doom's lively, energetic, hardcore verse, which completes the Black Knights part, in a track that legitimizes them mostly at every listen as some of the best and most hidden affiliates of the supergroup, at the time. The last stanza is performed by Tony Starks: he arrives with his drunk, slow, flowing style, he closes a great track, certainly the best of the whole LP, surprisingly.
11. "Terrorist" (ft. Killarmy and Black Knights)
The Black Knights remain in the album for the next song, which, like the previous one, takes its name from one of the performers: low and slow drum, heavy and pounding, mediocre sample, smooth and energetic hardcore delivery by PR Terrorist, followed by Doc Doom, still energetic, fluid, hardcore, he spits good rap. Killa Sin kills the cut with a great velvet and hardcore flow, so, Holocaust should have closed the track with the last verse, he starts the rap, but the song suddenly stops for some reason and takes away another of his classic verses. His performance is saved for the Japanese version, where the outro of Dom Pachino and Killa Sin are also present at the end of the track. The song boasts the absence of RZA and works wonderfully.
12. "Bobby Dit It (Spanish Fly)" (ft. Ghostface Killah, Islord, Royal Fam, Jamie Sommers and Ndira)
This is another Wu-posse track, but it falls short of the previous ones, not only because it sees the return of RZA on the mic, but because the production of The Abbot no longer works. Oriental-like sample, Islord intro, other digital sounds, cumbersome and poor, rusty, very bad drum. Islord opens the piece and his voice is annoying, it has a weak and cumbersome flow, scanty and clumsy. Timbo King delivers a short, inspired verse with hardcore style, preceding the hook from Spanish girl Ndira, who teases the track with essential short hooks. The third rapper is Bobby Digital, messy, rough, hardcore, then Ghostface comes with a fluid, flowing, but still raw style, before Jamie Sommers' last verse, practically freestyle.
13. "Handwriting on the Wall" (ft. Ms. Roxy and Ras Kass)
The piece number thirteen is short and is one of the most successful: rhythm supported exclusively by a wobbly and stammering piano, then more orderly, intro and verse by Ras Kass, closes a short verse of RZA, always hardcore and raw.
14. "Kiss of a Black Widow" (ft. Ol' Dirty Bastard)
Here ODB provides one of the highlights of the edition: excellent production of Inspectah Deck, snare drum + slow dry and tight drum, sample chipmunk soul from "Over" by Portishead, crazy intro from Dirt McGirt, RZA spits bars with raw energy, then BZA enters and smashes the track with its sprawling, chaotic, casual, wonderful delivery. Steels closes.
15. "Slow Grind Italian"
That piece is followed by the last useless skit of the album, performed in Italian by Lorenza Calamanderi, on a minimal rhythm.
16. "My Lovin' is Digi" (ft. Ms. Roxy)
Album's latest truly accessible song: dry tight drum machine, decent, dirty and rough, not very good strings, Force MD's hook, Ms Roxy's hook, Bobby Digital alternates its kinky and casual verses to Ms Roxy's continuous hooks.
17 "Domestic Violence" (ft. Jamie Sommers, Ms. Roxy and Tiffany)
The girl is also present in the ultra-misogynist "Domestic Violence", in which RZA vents all his anger towards his girlfriend: boom bap, pounding and tight, heavy and very hard drum, infinite intro performed by Tiffany, after a minute comes the only very long verse by Bobby Diggs, hardcore, aggressive, energetic, raw, tight. He shouts bars towards his girlfriend spitting the baddest possible, in the midst of some interlude from the girl, played by Jamie Sommers, then a long outro follows between RZA and Sommers.
18. "Project Talk" (ft. Baretta Nine)
This track features the intro and unique verse that Bobby Digital delivers together with Baretta Nine in back n forth. The rhythm is worse than usual, minimal, with a poor drum and samples that never came, the result of this ballad is grey and confusing, disappointing and bland.
19. "Lab Drunk"
Choice number 19 is the latest solo track from RZA, the guy offers three stanzas and hooks over a cumbersome beat, tight and nasty little pounding drum machine, weak sounds, poor loops and too tight.
20. "Fuck What You Think" (ft. 9th Prince and Islord of Killarmy)
Killarmy try to take what's left of this LP to the nearest safe haven: the penultimate piece has a tight and nasty heavy pounding drum coupled with meager sounds, Abbot's flow is poor on this tacky production, Islord isn't better, and the good 9th Prince is almost completely obscured by the drum and a bad mix by Tony Prendatt.
21. "Daily Routine" (ft. Baretta Nine of Killarmy)
The last song has another bad rhythm of RZA, weak production with poor drum and bad sounds, the boy has no energy even in rap, Baretta Nine has a similar style, and the track becomes immediately forgettable.
Final Thoughts
RZA's debut solo studio album, comes out during the second wave of Wu-Tang releases, four years after his debut with Gravediggaz, five years after "Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)", and seven years after his first EP. He's the sixth member of the group to debut, after GZA, Method Man, ODB, Raekwon and Ghostface Killah, and after the at-times-affiliated Cappadonna. The project is a gangsta rap album performed primarily by RZA's hedonistic alter-ego, Bobby Digital, on a production that abandons samples and embraces keyboards, in what the author himself calls a "digital orchestra".
The production is made almost exclusively by RZA, responsible for 19 of the 21 rhythms of the disc, while the two remaining beats are provided by King Tech for "Airwaves" and by Inspectah Deck for "Kiss of a Black Widow". The digital orchestra created by Steelz neither sound like an orchestra nor digital. Most of the time, the music is quite sparse, disappointing, old and cumbersome: the producer chooses some of the worst drums of the year and matches them with particularly bad and wack, anti-melodic, experimental sounds. It all sounds bad and random, with no definite path, with some annoying sounds that spoil the tracks. The mixing is awful, realized by half a dozen different dudes. The era of samples seems to be over: RZA, king of the scene a few years ago, brings just three of them in seventy minutes: one each for the respective ballads "Love Jones" and "My Lovin' is Digi", and one for "Mantis", which should be The Moments' "Love on a Two Way Street", which you already know, because Jay-Z and Alicia Keys made it rediscover in the mainstream with the hit "Empire State of Mind". Here, however, these samples aren't even perceived: the only ones that reach the ear are the one from "36 Chambers" in "Airwaves" and that of Portishead in "Kiss of a Black Widow", and both come from the other producers of the disco, King Tech and Inspectah Deck.
The album also disappoints from a lyrical point of view, in a document that clearly attests that RZA is one of the two / three weakest rappers of the Wu-Tang Clan. Completely unable to create anything lyrically close to the majesty and complexity of Wu-Tang's best solo records, RZA takes refuge in the crowded and incoherent world of gangsta rap, holing up in a corner and stepping out under the ripped, crumpled and dirty cloak of Bobby Digital, superhero alter-ego with whom he can say and do whatever he wants and thinks. From the point of view of the lyrics, the album deals with weed, women, money, material things, weapons, crime, violence, all without a real direction and with rambling stanzas, without a soul, preferring misogyny. The whole product is an outdated and now-stale cliché in rap, and the author delivers these bars shouting most of the time, with a hardcore, raw, dirty, aggressive style.
It's all overly messy from the start and it's a mess you may know about. The lyrics, the execution, the anger, the noise, the chaos, there are many elements that seem to be in common with the debut of Dirty Bastard, but unlike that project, this clutter and confusion don't seem to be "controlled" and there isn't someone who has enough personality and talent to make every moment he shows up in front of the microphone memorable, no matter how extravagant or senseless he may be.
The cover faithfully represents the album, better than it may seem. It's annoying for the eyes. There's something like fifty different colors. White dominates. In the center, the title, "RZA as Bobby Digital in Stereo", below is the great protagonist of rhythms and rap, The RZA himself, with the Wu logo on his chest and the biggest gun. Behind him, the Wu-Tang logo which is divided in two by the central figure of Bobby Digital: on the left the logo is in purple, on the right it's in yellow-orange. In the purple part, there are a couple of girls, below are two dudes doing stuff and above is a fun mini-helicopter that I don't know where it's going, but it's definitely funnier than this record. In the yellow-orange part, there's a guy shooting an unlikely automatic pistol and an A-Team van that has been blatantly stolen, repainted, and has Bobby Digital green lettering stuck to it, passing an explosion or something similar. Outside the logo, just a couple of steps behind RZA, is a girl sitting with a rifle.
The cover is as difficult to deal with as the album, but it's still important, because it immediately shows you everything there: confusion, above all. Disorder, and a lot of confusion. There's a guy who marches to his own drum, saying he has the biggest gun of all, there are women, random machine gun shots, explosions, crime, violence, guns, more women. Green-weed dominates everything from weapons to the girl's teal boots, from the van to the fumes of the explosion. The tracklist can be divided into three sections: the initial part consisting of the solo cuts of RZA, the central part where the guests arrive, and the final, where there's a solo regurgitation of Bobby Digital which is accompanied by Killarmy in the last tracks.
The numerous skits all feel out of place and useless. The idea was interesting, beautiful, if we want to understand it as a tribute to Charles V and his Empire, to which various quotations are attributable, in particular some precisely on the languages that Steelz reports here (German, French, Spanish and Italian). The performance is forgettable, it attenuates and almost makes the bond that these languages have among themselves casual.
The album features a remarkable number of Wu-Tang artists and affiliates, but it doesn't quite sound like a Clan album. Half of the members of the supergroup arrive for the solo debut of RZA, which means that half are missing: Masta Killa's contribution is ruined by the rhythm, but it was potentially good, Inspectah Deck is placed behind the keyboards and is absent on the mic, U-God is credited on "Domestic Violence", but I think he contributed to the writing, because I have no idea where he's during the performance of the song. Method Man boasts one of his best stanzas in "N.Y.C. Everything" and Ghostface Killah is one of the most present guests of the edition, with two well-executed spots. The Wu-Tang Clan is sometimes credited with "Kiss of a Black Widow", however, the performance is provided exclusively by Ol' Dirty Bastard, who kills the cut with one of his classic performances.
Among the affiliates, almost all the Killarmy (the only absent 4th Disciple and Shogun Assassin), half of the Black Knights, Timbo King of Royal Fam, Tekitha, Ms. Roxy and Jamie Sommers are presented: most of them offer good or solid performances, Islord is probably the least notable rapper among them, closely followed by Baretta Nine and 9th Prince, the brother of RZA. Ms. Roxy, the major guest on the tape, has a great voice and improves on several tracks that would originally be mediocre. Ras Kass, part of The Four Horsemen along with Killah Priest of Sunz of Man, offers a good performance in his song. In the midst of dozens of guests, Holocaust clearly stands out in the cut of the same name, with a deadly verse that breaks the record and leads it to be the MVP on RZA's debut album. Doc Doom! comes very close to his friend and is the second best of the edition. Then Killa Sin, and everyone else.
Released by Gee Street and V2, distributed by BMG, the album has an honest commercial result, coming third among the rap records and in the top 20 of the pop chart, being certified gold by the RIAA in three months. The insiders are divided between harsh criticism and lukewarm applause. Consisting of 21 tracks (4 skits) and 68 minutes of listening, the album is the biggest disappointment of the year in hip-hop: there's a dude yelling random things all the time over cheap and weak music, interspersed with useless skits. Ultra-bloated, super-long, exhausting and horrible record, between lyrics and rhythms, RZA is at his worst so far.
Highlights: "N.Y.C. Everything", "Holocaust (Silkworm)", "Terrorist", "Bobby Did It (Spanish Fly)", "Handwriting on the Wall", "Kiss of a Black Widow".
Rating: 4.5/10.
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