U-God's Resume #36, "Rumble"

--Official Stats--
Artist: U-God feat. Letha Face, Inspectah Deck, and Method Man
Song: 7. "Rumble"
Producer: True Master
Album: Golden Arms Redemption
Release Date: October 5, 1999

BARF! Check it out. I mean check out my barf. I made it. It's a gift to the world. My gift. Ta-dah!

We set out on this study of U-God to demonstrate that U isn't a wack MC, and he's not. Yet we've been spending a lot of time bashing him and basically making excuses for him. As I sit now to listen to Rumble and then write about it I'm overcome with apathy. What's the point of this? This song is not going to be good. We ALL know that. In fact none of the songs left on this terrible album are going to be good. The best we can hope for is "okay" or "tolerable" right? So what happened? U seemed to be on somewhat of a roll for a little bit there with his small contributions to songs where other people were involved. He was hittin'. Then we got Black Shampoo and everyone was like "whoa there, wtf" and people didn't even know about saying 'wtf' in the 90's. Then we get to this point and every damn song is like wtf. WTF HAPPENED? I think we've already mentioned that U's lyrics are still pretty much the same...strings of nonsense. Fine. That's U-God's style and it works for him. This is how he does it, "This is how we do it" - Montell Jordan. We've also mentioned that the production is appalling. WTF wit dat? The production is just terrible. Awful. We've established that when production is on point, every single person in the Wu sounds amazing, so why is the production not on point. This is a major league rap crew, why is the production ever bush league?  Would this album have been better if the production was on? Definitely.

So, let me sidetrack here into dangerous territory: Joe Budden. Remember his dispute with Method Man, you know the one...uh, the one that ended with Raekwon punching Joe Budden? Yeah. Keep it on wax, boys. Let's not have any actual fighting. Keep it professional, only with deeply personal insults on your hit songs that everyone hears. So let me be clear: Method Man is a much better rapper. He's a decorated vet. He's a dope MC, and he's established himself as one of the best ever. That dude rips a mic, no question. It was pretty shallow for Joe Budden to go after him, and I think in this case Method Man didn't have to respond on wax. I would have liked it (everyone would have liked it), but it didn't really work out that way (Deck took a stab at Budden and connected, nice teamwork there INS). Method Man won before it even begun, son. But the point I'm trying to make is that at one point Budden said something like "Meth shouldn't be mad at me, he should be mad at the RZA for abandoning him." I agree with that statement! The less involvement from the RZA on these solo projects (Meth, Deck, & U-God), the worse the album is. The RZA produced tracks are always the best.

So here is my question: Why in the hell were True Master, 4th Disciple, Mathematics, Deck, and the rest producing so much average shit? How was it that nobody was around to tell these MCs that their albums were weak? The production team let everyone down. I'm not saying that anyone listed is a bad producer (I'm not saying that at all, they've all dropped dope shit, except for Deck), they just put out work that wasn't the best...and the RZA should have been there telling them their tracks weren't correct. Meth should have been telling them, and U-God should have been telling them: THIS TRASH ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH, IT'S BORING AND UNINSPIRED. It's like selling really good pure and uncut product, and then once people are addicted you start cutting it with bullshit. Eventually it gets so far away from the original formula that it no longer satisfies the addict. That's a problem. Worse, somehow when outside big money production was brought in (Meth's "Break Ups 2 Make Ups"), the tracks were just as bad but in a different way.

Eeeh, that was long. I guess we should actually listen to this track... This is a True Master track, an official member of the Wu stable, so I'm willing to bet that this song will remind me of a good Wu beat, but will still be very boring.

7. "Rumble"


Well that was better than I expected and remembered, except for that chorus. Does anyone like choruses that feature listing shit? No. It's weak and way too common. Rage, Rock, Roll, Fight, Brawl, Fall, RUUMMMBBBLLLEE! Oh brother. No more lists, okay fellas. It's funny that as soon as I go off on some huge tangent about the lacking production on Wu albums we get a song with decent production. This beat is nice and everyone sounds good on it, the weakest link is that chorus...and U-God, who comes weakest of the four (he is even barely bested by Letha Face). But it's not a bad song by any means. I think this song accomplishes two things: proving Deck is a brutal MC and proving that the Wu is great as a crew. I don't know who thought it would be a good idea for U-God to handle most of his album by himself, but that was a mistake. You gotta have support son, shit, even Illmatic had AZ.

Let's check the lyrics

Countdown...
Are you ready? Are you mad inside?
Got you strapped down to your seats
Outta the doorway, bullets ripped, full clip
God speed, approach follow my lead
Firewinds gust, empire crush
Full thrust, fall in the hole, roll wit the rush
Untouchable chunk of a earwax assault

Soundwaves slay, out the back came smoke
My belly-full prance dance, avalanche quote
Down slope, elegant as Fantasia
Killa whale tale inhale, black male from Asia
All out the wood works, hood shirts and wizards
No match, unhatch, the rap is rigid
In the shaft, shotty cop, hip hop to the limit
Nightwatch, pad mark
Sparks spin a quake nuclear blast, heavy on the cash
Gimmie what it takes NOW!!

Chorus [U-God] 2x
RAGE ROCK ROLL FIGHT
BRAWL FALL RUMBLLLLLLEEE!!!

IN CONCLUSION: NOT BAD. I should have saved that rant for a wacker track.

Track Score: 6/10

U-God’s Score: 5/10

Impact on Rep (+,-,=): Improves

Next Week: U-God's solo, track 8: "Pleasure or Pain". I'll take the pleasure please.

About this series: U-God’s Resume is a series of posts which looks at each line of U-God’s entire career to determine if his status as ‘wack’ is justified (as labeled by internet morons). I think it is not. U-God is dope. We'll prove it. Leave it to the Tort Team.