Nathaniel "Kool G Rap" Wilson was born in New York and grew up in Corona, Queens, with the producer Eric B. Around the mid-eighties, looking for an MC to collaborate with, through Eric B. he met DJ Polo. Mr. Magic and Marley Marl allowed the duo to go to their studio to record a demo, "It's a Demo", without much fantasy, but the track, recorder quickly, it convinces Marley Marl to embraces both to the Juice Crew.
In 1986, the duo appeared on Mr. Magic's radio show. In the same year, Kool G Rap & DJ Polo sign with Cold Chillin' Records and release their debut single, "It's a Demo", with "I'm Fly" as b-side. The piece is followed by "Rikers Island" (1987) and "Poison" (1988), then Kool G Rap is guest on the Juice Crew's "The Symphony" before the release of the debut album of the duo in 1989. The disk is produced and mixed solely by Marley Marl.
This is an incredible debut album for Kool G Rap & DJ Polo. Marley Marl samples from everywhere to provide a solid funky soundscape on which G Rap is unleashed: excellent storyteller, lyrically he's in front of most of the hip hop artists of the scene of the early nineties and technically competes with Rakim only, inserting rapid internal rhymes into its complex multi-syllabic rhyming patterns and spitting fresh and intelligent bars especially braggadocio that pulls out of a good varied vocabulary, with a devastating effortless delivery that presents a hardcore style and an incredibly impeccable flow, smoothness, dope, among the best ever.
Fun and awesome project, including several classic cuts, it flows pretty quickly helped by the excellent scratches of DJ Polo and by successful minimal hooks: it's one of the best albums released by the Juice Crew and with the title track lays the foundations of what it will be the mafioso rap, cinematic and East Coast subgenre of the gangsta rap, however some unnecessary homophobic and misogynist lines ("Truly Yours") and commercial crossover cuts ("Truly Yours", "Cars", "She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not") demote this album from masterpiece to [cult] classic status. Kool G Rap has an unstoppable rapping due to an enviable breath control, here he doesn't offer his best performance as the production isn't the best in Marley Marl's career, yet the album is a must-listen.
Highlights: "Road to the Riches", "It's a Demo", "Men at Work", "Poison".
Rating: 9/10.
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