After releasing his first album, a sort of large collection of songs released in the mid to late nineties, Shabazz the Disciple rejoins Sunz of Man and reconnects with Wu. A few years later, he released his second solo effort, a street album consisting of eleven original songs, three skits, six remixes and one bonus track. The CD is printed in a limited number of copies, about a thousand, and distributed independently, also through its website. The cover features the rapper on the right sitting on a throne, on top of which rests a golden crown, flanked by two specular golden lions, image often frequent in heraldry and also present in the coat of arms of the tribe of Judah, to which Shabazz refers several times during the listening.
To the left of the cover come the problems. The artist's symbol is bigger than anything, the artist's name is present at the top with a font that makes it incomprehensible and unreadable, while the title of the disc is shown below in white, with another horrible and illegal font. The cover of the re-release of Black Stone of Mecca in 2021 is clearer and humbler. It might fade into the background, but Shabazz has a golden crown of thorns on his forehead, tied to the title. It's an easy reference to the almost homonymous film released a few years earlier, harshly criticized by cinema journalists and that quickly made Mel Gibson the most hated Hollywood star of the moment. To please the media, the promotional campaign of the film states that it was also previewed by the Pope, who would have recognized its historical validity, when instead, according to his assistants, the pontiff would have stated: «this dude (Mel Gibson) totally freaked out after they gave him the Oscar for "Braveheart", that was a good movie.» The title of Shabazz's album is therefore judged unfortunate.
The rapper decides not to make use of guests, bringing his cousins with him, the production is provided by Shabazz himself, Carlos Bess, MOD the Black Marvel of Godz Wrath Productions and Cilvaringz (all names close to the double v), along with Dam's & SLA, The Beat Butcher, Brain Power, Yogi of The Hitmen, Ze Gonzalez, MistaJam, Hala-X, Street Legend, and Sikh Knowledge. The music selected by the Red Hook emcee is quite good, even if it does nothing at all to distinguish itself from the rest of the 2000s boom bap scene: robust drums, lukewarm bass lines and melodic samples that never bother.
Lyrically, Shabazz mixes spiritual and street verses, making several songs focused on religion, some thug songs about crime and gangsterism, some personal clipping about the loss of loved ones ("Marion"; "Preme", this last one isn't the producer of Sunz of Man) and others dedicated to the love of hip-hop ("Heavenly Bride") in a track similar to "I Used to Love H.E.R." by Common. The lyricism is next to being abstract for its difficult understanding of texts fairly close to nonsense than for the use of metaphors or hidden meanings. The second part includes several remixes of his singles released in the nineties, then the disc closes on a high note in "Kiss of Betrayal (Hug of Judas)", the best production of the street album.
Shabazz the Disciple is rapping with confidence and hardcore, loose and fast style throughout the record, however, he still may not convince you to be one of the best emcees on the circuit. The production never expires in bad rhythms and at the same time never makes him make the leap in quality, although some details are appreciable such as the hook of Tara Chase which gives a more colorful look to the already remarkable "Red Hook Day", and surely Shaka Amazulu the 7th's mastering in the 2021 edition cleans up a lot and takes away a lot of rawness that was left over from the original sessions, from which it seemed that the mixing was sometimes overlooked. The Black Stone of Mecca reissue doesn't sound like a street album, which is good, and it's a solid, compact effort that's enjoyable for Killa Beez fans.
Rating: 7/10.
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