Westside Connection — Bow Down

In September 1996, the East vs. West war touches one of its most violent peaks and the death of 2Pac convinces Ice Cube to take the field not to stop the feud, but to win it with its own battalion also made up of WC and Mack 10, more or less the same age: the three have already collaborated recently on the solo albums of Mack 10 and WC, the Los Angeles supergroup Westside Connection is born, one of the first in hip-hop. In a short time, within a month, the group's first studio album comes out, ten tracks plus three skits produced by Bud'da, QDIII, Cedric Samson, Ice Cube and Binky Mack, with guests such as K-Dee, The Comrades and All From tha I.

The disc is recorded very quickly and you can notice it without too much effort while listening to it: it's all too hasty, Ice Cube hasn't released anything for three years, his career appears to be in decline and here he sounds at its worst, Mack 10 proves to be far from other performers, while WC shines with its own light and obscures others in every track, keeping a sharper pen and reciting its lyrics with greater energy. Lyrically, the record revolves around generic, trivial and tired gangsta themes, with topics such as drugs, murder, guns and women.

With "King of the Hill", Ice Cube replies to Cypress Hill, who dissed him in "No Rest for the Wicked", and makes sure that his LP doesn't treat weed, which should originally flank the other main arguments, however, the producers don't seem to be aware of it, because the music sounds like a poor and weak copy of DJ Muggs' beats, where only a couple of well-chosen samples (that of The Stylistics in "Gangstas Make the World Go Round" and that of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" in "The Gangsta, the Killa and the Dope Dealer") give a minimum replay value to the songs, excluding the overall performance of WC in the midst of a lot of ignorant rap. The rhythms aren't telling me anything, they're very faded, tasteless and cheap, they're a bit dark, g-funk rusty and dull, there's little funk, a rare use of synths, bass lines are scarce, the drum is dry and harsh but doesn't beat.

Released by Priority, the album is first in the rap chart, second in the pop chart, and hits the UK charts, becoming one of the best-sellers for two consecutive seasons, platinum in three months in the United States. The effort polarizes the critics, who are divided between those who consider it one of the best works in their discographies and those who panned it: among the few themes browsed by the project, there's the rivalry with the East Coast and the Big Apple in particular, Robert Christgau himself feels called into question in "All the Critics in New York", dedicating a couple of sentences to the record and hastily marking it with one of his worst ratings. It's curious the review of "allmusic", which gives a very positive evaluation to the product, while criticizing it negatively all the time. With just under fifty minutes of material, it's not the worst album by a supergroup and it's not even an essential listen, both Ice Cube and WC made great music before this tape. Not recommended.