U-God's Resume #22: "Diesel"

--Official Stats--
Artist: Wu-Tang Clan
Song: "Diesel"
Album: Soul In The Hole: Original Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture
Release Date: July 29, 1997

I know what you're thinking besides "what's the point of this" and "why ru wasting you life with this"...you're thinking "you're taking this too seriously." You know what? We're not taking this seriously at all. If we were, this whole blog would be about how hip hop was hit or miss even in its glory days and now it's an absolute disaster. I'll be serious, if you happen to catch a rap song on the radio today it's going to be awful unless you're tuned into some weird college station or some satellite trash, and even then you can bet your ass that besides yourself, the only other person listening is the disc jockey. Nobody listens to good music.


"But what about the internet?" you say, "you're always talking about all the good hip hop you find there." Yeah that's true, but do you know how many people are listening to it? None. Zero. If I put up a post about the dopest hip hop song out right now it will get zero hits. If I just put up a picture of Rick Ross it'll get a thousand hits a day. High interest. That's the truth. People would rather look at a fucking picture of Rick Ross than to even be introduced to one track that's actually decent. That's you. You do that. Yeah there is a ton of good hip hop coming out all the time but you'll never hear it because you're too busy looking for fucking pictures of the Ying Yang Twin's gross tattoos. YOU'RE THE WORST.


So what does that have to do with the song Diesel by the Wu-Tang Clan? I DON'T KNOW, WHY DON'T YOU ASK YOUR FRIEND AKON? That's what you care about. ALL OF YOU. You know what? Just leave the blog. Do it. I don't want to review this for you. I'll even make it super easy for you:

CLICK HERE FOR SOMETHING YOU'LL LOVE AND DON'T COME BACK 

Well I hope my anger doesn't spill over into this review (spoiler alert: it will). So this song is from the pandering money-grab soundtrack to the movie "Soul in the Hole". The cover points out that some of the songs were just "inspired" by the movie. I'm sure that the Cocoa Brovaz went out and saw "Soul in the Hole" and were so inspired that they rushed home to make "Won on  Won" (which was a good song actually). I bet their inspiration had something to do with dinero. Fuck whoever put this soundtrack together. Cross marketing. I can just hear some rich fat-cat executive saying "Hey! That Soul to the Hole movie is gonna flop since it's a piece of junk so let's get a bunch of rappers on the soundtrack, those heathen consumer morons will buy the CD to hear their favorite rapper then they'll see the movie. They're dumb! People who like basketball like rap as well. We'll all be richer!"


All that aside, I did buy this soundtrack AND I seem to remember liking it. I had a giant CD case and for some reason this CD was in the front and I got a good look at the Basketball themed CD all the time (even though I didn't listen to it that much). I also remember this song as being good (probably thanks to its inclusion on some Killa Bee's album or Wu greatest hits album or mixtape or whatever). WHO CARES. Let's hear the track...


"Diesel"



There is nothing better than starting a song with ODB talking nonsense, actually it's not nonsense. It's ODB literally asking for help: "They already did 2Pac in...Biggie Smalls..someone help me. Someone help me please!" That's heavy. ODB's verse is understated but perfect. Rae is next and the odd sound leaves on the vocals are what makes this track work so well. Sure the beat is okay (not great) and the lyrics are banging throughout, but the sound levels kind of level the playing field for the featured MCs and put the focus on the lyrics themselves rather than the personalities involved. It's almost like the RZA is trying to pull people into a trance. It's great. Anyway, after Rae, ODB gets raw again for a few lines, then Meth comes in (grimy Tical Meth, not polished Meth). ODB is back just to usher in the RZA and holy shit, can it get any better than that? Meth to ODB to RZA over a raw beat. No.


So then U-God comes in with this:

Thirty-six anger, dirty language is the stranger
The mangler, the honor roll singer righteous finger
When we shine-a, we always find a never minor major
Hard to spot we dangerous with our behavior
Then it's back to the RZA for a few lines, then back to U for this:

I aim slang I maintain, through the main vein
The answer came clever, when we do greatness through trial and error
Mile of terror motormouth, let the odor out
Fumin greater, the temper in my spine huminator
The super grass childish blast sleepy eye stash
The hashish masterpiece, Osirus is the virus
This split second splash, severe drop is near pop
There's fallin teardrops, now is it worth your career?

You know what, I think this was an ODB song, maybe for a future (and unmade) ODB album. Let's look at the evidence: (1) ODB is heavily featured (2) Raekwon, Method Man and U-God each mention him specifically (3) it sounds like an album track (not a soundtrack song). That's it. I rest my case.

So I feel like I've had nothing but good things to say about this song specifically. The truth is that it's not that good. I mean it's solid but I think it's missing some ingredient. Energy maybe. I don't know, it's nothing that I want to repeat anytime soon. Despite ODB really knocking it out of the park. As for Baby U, I think he (once again) did the worst of all involved. You can take that to the bank. Word 'em up.

Track Score: 6/10

U-God’s Score: 3/10

Impact on Rep (+,-,=): None

Next Week: U-God helps Cappadonna out with his debut album on the track  "Supa Ninjaz"

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.

Trackmasters: Yo! MTV Raps Freestyle

It goes without saying that MTV is a joke and THE WORST and nobody likes it except for a few teenage shut-ins. They should really just drop the "M" right? That's what people say, "they don't even play music SMH." Well I say they should drop the M and the TV and then off the planet.  Anyway, they're a bunch of toady posers that put on  a bunch of shows about really dumb high school pranks and being pregnant as a teenager. So they got their LOLz and OMGs covered, right? WHO CARES? NOBODY AT ALL.

Okay, so long ago they had a show about rap music and it was okay. Really? Yep. But if anyone ever tells you that their show was "great" or "awesome", they've either been blinded by nostalgia, or they've got bad taste, because it wasn't that good. Ed Lover and Dre were good....and sometimes the videos were good, but not usually. It was all hit or miss. Anyway when the show got cancelled they had a freestyle farewell and it was ten minutes long and a lot of big names spit: Rakim, KRS-One, Erick Sermon, Chubb Rock, MC Serch, Redman, Method Man, Large Professor, Special Ed, and Craig Mack. Wow! Plus DJ Scribble was on the turntables. AND Flava Flav got placed. There is nothing better than hearing a lineup like that, no matter where it's coming from.

But why am I posting this? Well, this is from 1995, shortly after "Tical" dropped. Please notice how Method Man dominates his peers and superiors .This is the Method Man we were dealing with back then. He destroys some of the biggest names in rap...in a freestyle...with Rakim and KRS One. That's incredible. Great to watch, plus Erick Sermon killing it! Redman! This is just a good video: check it out.




Oh, 1995 Method Man, please come back to us. We miss you.

As a bonus I'm also throwing up an old ODB freestyle, also from MTV. Needless to say, it's a classic. O killing it. Look at how different this is from everything else ever. RIP to the grandmaster...MUCH RESPECT:



How about a little more Meth? Sure.


I can't stop. How about the Wu spitting over one of the best beats in history:


Living in Philly freestyles like this would come up from time to time on the radio or on street mixtapes. Honestly, it was Wu-Tang at their best. My all time favorite ODB verse was one he did for some radio station in New York (Hot 97 I guess) and somehow it made it on a mixtape I bought off the street in Philly, that shit never made it to any of his albums but it was dope. It was the best. Anyway, that shit doesn't happen anymore, Method Man is making candy commercials. 

MTV Score 0/10
MTV Raps Freestyle Score 7/10
ODB Freestyle Score 10/10
Method Man Freestyle #1 Score 10/10
Wu-Tang Freestyle Score 10/10

Thanks to Village Voice for the idea of blogging about some of these vidoes!

U-God's Resume #4, SWV: "Anything (Old Skool Radio Version)"

U-God’s Resume #4: SWV "Anything (Old Skool Radio Version)"

--Official Stats--
Artist: SWV featuring The Wu-Tang Clan
Song: "Anything (Old Skool Radio Version)"
Album: "SWV The Remixes"
Release Date: May 10, 1994

Well, in the examination of U-God’s resume we’ve finally moved beyond the debut release of the Wu-Tang Clan and will now get into the many side projects and solo albums from U’s fellow clansman. Why are we doing this? Because U-God has a pretty lousy reputation and I want to find out if it’s justified (because I like him, and it's not justified).

So where did Baby U go from the classic “Enter the Wu-Tang?” album? To SWV, of course.

Yep. SWV. An R&B act also known as “Sisters with Voices” somehow made a track featuring “The Wu-Tang Clan” which, of course, only meant Ol’ Dirty, Method Man, and U-God.  For the record, SWV was massively popular with songs that everybody loved. So why not pair them up with the next big hip hop group? The soundtrack to “Above the Rim” was the perfect opportunity. Well, not on the soundtrack exactly, but a SWV remix album for a song from the soundtrack. You know how record companies are: lots of songs, remixes, cross promotion, goldmines, not making things people want, and money in the bank. SWV's Anything was on the soundtrack, but the version with the Clan came out a few months later on the SWV "Remixes" album.

Well, to my knowledge, I’ve never heard this song before.  So let’s check it out…

“Anything (Old Skool Radio Version)"

Well, this is terrible.  If I were a fan of the Wu-Tang Clan (I am) and I saw them on here (I did) and then I listened to this (I did), I would be very disappointed (I was). I’ve never been a fan of modern R&B, and this sounds especially empty. This is worse R&B than normal. So, I hate most of track automatically.

"But what about U-God? How did he do?" - U-God fans.

Oh yeah, well once again he’s performing with the Clan’s two biggest stars of the time: Ol’ Dirty and Method Man, much like his appearance on Protect Ya Neck (where he was between them), only this time his four lines are sandwiched inside of Method Man’s verse. But somehow, this time, Meth’s closing lines are reused segments from his main verse, it's weird, but I guess someone didn’t want U-God delivering the last line on the track. And that's strange because U-God delivers a pretty good verse considering the (poor) quality of the track and the generic verses delivered by both ODB and Meth. I’d be willing to bet that our favorite MCs were somewhat limited in what they could deliver here, so they might have played it safe. In fact, I bet they never even met SWV for this recording. Who knows? Looking back from almost twenty years later (!)  I would say U-God comes out on top in this track. The champ! Good for him, he earned it and whatever. I feel like I’ve heard everything that ODB and Meth spit on here on a bunch of on other tracks. Poor Meth, he sounds like he’s selling his soul when he says the “S-S-double-double-U to the V-V-V-V” line. On the flip, U’s lines sound raw and fresh.  Nice job, U-God, even if your lines don’t make sense and your contribution is very short…

Now, what I hear him say is different from what the internet says he says, get it? Here are both versions of the lyrics.

Internet Generally Accepted Lyrics:

Another chapter from the Wu-Tang group
Take a look or a peak, killer bees never sleep
Nonstop, put you on the choppin block
Unorthodox, attitude to melting pot

Tortoise General Approved Lyrics:

Another chapter from the Wu-Tang book
Take a look or a peek, killer bees never sleep
Nonstop, put you on the choppin’ block
Unorthodox, attitude to melt the pot

Whatever. Oh, also, how weird is it when Ol' Dirty comes in on a R&B track? It gets me every time: a raw MC (that probably doesn't appeal to many women) comes in over a smooth beat and beautiful singing with bellowing (basically) and slurred rhymes. ODB: YOU'RE THE BEST. Reverse verse.

Song Score: 2/10

U-God Score: 7/10

Impact on Rep (+, -, =): None (nobody heard this)

Next time: We skip ahead over a year to U-God’s verse on “Knuckleheads” from Raekwon’s “Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…”.  Party on, Rae. Party on, Tort.

Caught in the headlights.

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.

U-God's Resume #3: "Protect Ya Neck"

U-God's Resume #3: "Protect Ya Neck"

Watch ya Step Kid.

--Official Stats--
Artist: U-God
Song: Bridge on "Protect Ya Neck"

Album: Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)

Release: 1992

In this series of posts we examine U-God's contributions to the Wu-Tang Clan one line at a time to determine if his status as "wack MC" is deserved. I think it is not, but let's let the facts speak for themselves.

First of all, I screwed up.  The first time anyone heard U-God's voice was not on "Enter the Wu-Tang" at all, but on the single for Protect Ya Neck which dropped over a year ahead of the complete album. Now, I think the chances that anyone heard this single before they got the full album are pretty slim, especially in the less populated parts of the country, but some people did, which means some people's first exposure to U-God was here. So, what did they hear?

"Protect Ya Neck"

Protect Ya Neck is the Wu-Tang song.  It was my favorite song for about a year (when it was replaced with Bring the Pain), and it is one of the best hip hop songs ever made. That's a fact. It's one of the few tracks that features the entire Clan (except for Masta Killa) and doesn't feel like it runs for and hour. How did they accomplish this? No down time, no transitions, and short verses. U-God rocks a shorter-than-short verse here, also called a bridge (or transition). U-God demonstrates how he got his nickname the 4-Bar Killer, because he kills it in four bars:

Ooooh, what, grab my nut get screwed
Oooow, here comes my Shaolin style
True, B-A-ba-B-Y  U
to my crew with the "SOOOO"!

Unfortunately, he does not kill it.  His four bars are unintelligible.  I've literally heard this song a thousand times, and I've never really listened to his lines.  I know this song, but I've never tried to memorize it. I know almost all the words, but I've never picked up the second half of Rae's verse, some lines in Ghost's verse, or any U-God's lines (except for the 'sooo'). This is a pretty common scenario for me, Rae and Ghost lines just don't stick in my mind, I think they're too tricky for me to passively remember (and that's definately not a knock against them), their verses are the TOAST. I think that there are three reasons I don't know U-God's lines at all: one, they're really short; two, I was never that impressed by them; and three, I had no idea what he was saying until today, June 15, 2011, when I looked up the lyrics for the first time ever (I guess). Like twenty years after the song came out and it's the first time I realized that U-God was spelling "Baby-U".  I never got that before.

So how did our boy do? Well, he did spit on one of the all time greatest hip hop songs. But he didn't get a full verse, and he didn't really say anything, and I've never understood him. So where does that leave him? To be fair (I've made this point before) Baby-U is sandwiched between Method Man and ODB, who both deliver stellar lines. In fact, I think Dirty spits one of his all time greatest verses, so how could anyone compare to ODB's best? Even though it's probably the worst verse in the song I'll give this one to U-God, it's not great, but it is on "Protect Ya Neck" and it is a great bridge. You'd be lucky to have a bridge like that on anything you make.

U-God Score: 6/10

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

"Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)" - Overall

So how did U-God do overall on the Wu-Tang's debut album? Okay I guess. Definately not as good as anyone else in the Clan), but that's because he wasn't really featured (maybe Masta Killa faired a little worse as he was also largely absent from the album, but who knows?). His one verse on Da Mystery of Chessbxin was good, and that's his only real contribution to the album, so what can I say? He did good. He get's his big intro ("he a psyochopathic thinker"), and a few mentions (Clan In Da Front), so his reputation is established and he was well positioned to progress with his career.

U-God Score: 7/10
Impact on Rep (+, -, =): Improves

Next: U-God’s verse in "Anything (Old School Remix)" by SWV. Yep, that's right.

Coat size: XXXXL

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.

U-God's Resume #2: "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'"

U-God's Resume #2: Da Mystery of Chessboxin'

--Official Stats--
Artist: U-God
Song: First Verse on "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'"
Album: Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
Release: November 9, 1993

The intent of this series of posts is to look at U-God's career line by line to discover if is status as "the worst in the Wu Tang" is justified.  Personally, I don't think so, but a lot of people do, so let's get on with it, son. Well last time we looked at U-God's first ever contribution to the Wu, and it was him barley talking in a crowded intro, it was so subtle that I couldn't even grade it.  This time, we're fortunate enough to hear an entire verse from the mysteriously absent clansmen on the classic track "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'" from Wu Tang's debut album.

"Da Mystery of Chessboxin'"

This is the first and only time that anyone in the general public got to hear U-God spit (for years) with the exception of a short bridge on the essential "Protect Ya Neck" (later in this same album). After this, the next verse we get from U on a Wu album is on "Knuckleheadz" from Raekwon's Only Built 4 Cuban Linx (two years later).  So how does our boy do holding down the opening spot?

DOPE.  U-God kills it without question.

Raw I'm gonna give it to you, with no trivia
We're like cocaine straight from Bolivia
My hip-hop will rock and shock the nation
like the Emancipation Proclamation
Weak MC's approach with slang that's dead
you might as well run into the wall and bang your head
I'm pushin' force, my force your doubtin'
I'm makin' devils cower to the Caucus Mountains

He comes rugged and raw, his flow is flawless and fits perfectly into the RZA production.  Now the problem is that this track features incredible verses from everyone: Deck, Rae, Ghost, ODB, and especially Method man.  In fact, I bet that if you read through the lyrics I posted above your brain went ahead and threw in Deck's opening line which followed U-God's last ("Well I Messiah, set the microphone on fire...").  Masta Killa brings the least memorable verse of the song, but still, five great verses make it hard for anyone to stand out.  That being said U-God holds his own here.  He doesn't deliver the best verse, but, shit, he kills it.  If he were being judged on this verse alone, he would come out ahead.  But instead he gets lost on the mix of great verses.

Score: 10/10
Impact on Rep (+, -, =): Improves

Next: U-God’s Bridge in "Protect Ya Neck" and Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) Overall.



"Mr. U-God, the hat you charged the company was Sable, this is Nutria."

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.

Yo! Just What You Wanted: Wu Rankings

Okay!  This is the dumbest post in the history of the United States of America!  I know we're a young country, but that’s not the point.  The point is why are you reading this? Seriously.  Go out and dig a drainage ditch or something to benefit your farm, help your community.

You’re still here! Wwwhhhaaaatttt???

For this amazing post I'm going to rank the 10 members of the Wu Tang Clan in 1997 (at the end of RZA’s 5 year plan). Then I'll take it a step further and rank them today (15 years later).  We'll answer this question: what's happened in my opinion?  Hint: Win for you (not for U-God).  



Ranking Score: 2/10