First mixtape of Jamel "Lord Superb" Cummings, rapper from Far Rockaway, Queens. Superb, sometimes considered one of the ghostwriters of the Wu-Tang Clan, is part of the American Cream Team of Raekwon, which has a short life between the end of the nineties and the beginning of the two thousand, disbanding to coincide with the death of Chip Banks and Superb's incarceration in 2001. He debuted on one of the RZA soundtracks and made two appearances on Ghostface Killah's "Supreme Clientele" album. When he was released from prison in 2004, Superb claims to have written that album entirely, which effectively marks the end of his career in the industry. Except for a few appearances on albums by affiliates who have distanced themselves from the Wu-universe, he no longer participates in records of the thickness of Tony Starks.
Hence the title of the mixtape, which directly refers to that work. The cover, simple, depicts the rapper next to the Statue of Liberty, then in the center the name of the author in white and below, much less evident, the title. I can't find the credits for the production. Accredited guests are Raekwon of Wu-Tang Clan, Stack Bundles of Byrdgang, and plenty of amateur guys, such as Young City, Un Pacino, Perry, Ammo, Chinx Drugz, Jitta, Shorty Real, Hardcore, and Convict. In theory, it's still winter when this tape comes out, in the first days of February 2009. It's been nine years since GFK's sophomore. It has also been several seasons since Superb's group disbanded and since his time in prison. With an hour of material, over twenty tracks, and definitely fewer skits than usual to be a little more than an amateur tape, the record isn't as powerful as something you expect from those who claim to have entirely written one of the best hip-hop albums of the decade.
Production is heavily irregular. Sometimes the interpreter finds quite competent beats, other times the rhythm is mediocre, scandalous and excessively cheap or sluggish, weak, poor, not accessible. Some of these boom bap solutions don't work, the drums are cheap, the samples sound bad, even the chipmunk soul ones that inevitably try to draw back to the original clientele, and the beats for the club obviously aren't good, as well as the song with the autotune. Some just aren't memorable, and that's the case with the Stack Bundles song, for example. Thematically, Superb writes mainly on gangsta topics in a generic way, talking about guns, drugs, crime, violence, street life, other problems. There's a desire for revenge, but there's no strength for revenge, there's no energy you expect from someone who claims to get (again) his place in the game, and this lack of strength turns into something that is closer to resentment and regret.
"Can't Outrap Me" has that energy, it has that strength, it has that will. The rhythm is stolen from a classic, boom bap with harsh, hard, dry, violent, midtempo drum machine, Lord Superb expresses himself with anger, raw, shouting. It's an isolated cut in the tape, as much as the tape itself is isolated from the rest of the Wu releases and from the underground circuit. He practically falls on deaf ears, unheard. The Queens rapper spits resignedly into the rest of the tape, subdued in some of his best choices, namely the beats of Ghostface's "All That I Got Is You" ("Meetin' with Death"), "I Can Feel It in the Air" by Beanie Sigel ("I Feel It Too"), and on a melodic production with one of the few correct drums for the dedication to his friend Chip Banks (perhaps the only one with whom he had no problems in the American Cream Team). Eventually the featuring of Raekwon arrives, but the production doesn't assist the two performers.
The album is released by Farrock and especially by G-Clef's Chambermusik, it doesn't play in favor of those who believe that Superb is the main author of that album, because, although this is definitely not the best material he has ever recorded (it's said that the best, recorded in the nineties, has been lost), there are no noteworthy moments and ultimately, it's not an essential listening for the Wu-stans. 5/10.
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