Ice Cube - Amerikkka's Most Wanted

Public Enemy was supposed to be the group that woke everybody up. And yes, they were controversial, but the revolution was nipped in the bud when a little group called NWA broke out on the West Coast with just as much anger and noise, but instead of promoting black people standing up and fighting the power, they glorified black people killing each other for no reason. The powers that be REALLY got up in arms about NWA and so of course every kid wanted to be them. Forget being a revolutionary. Well Ice Cube was having none of it, and he broke east to join up with the Bomb Squad. "Amerikkka's Most Wanted" is the product of this collaboration. These days, with Ice Cube regularly starring in family films, it's easy to forget that he was a very controversial figure in the early 90's. I remember reading a Newsweek with him on the cover pointing a gun at the camera. On "Amerikkka's Most Wanted," he does not tone down the violence of NWA *or* the revolutionary spirit of Public Enemy, and the Bomb Squad's production fuses the squall of noise we love from PE albums with the deep funk and banging beats of NWA, and they fit perfectly. This is probably their best production work; check out the title track, "You Can't Fade Me" and "Endangered Species". Cube's lyrics, as always, are hard hitting and full of internal rhymes, but delivered naturally and forcefully. Chuck D and Flavor Flav both make appearances, and Cube takes vicious shots at everyone. The misogyny is pretty heavy so watch out. Otherwise, to my ears it has aged pretty well, and is the perfect fusion of the heyday of pre-"Chronic" gangsta rap with fist-pumping rage at the system. No radio hits, just hard beats, hard rhymes, deep funk.