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Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II


Guest Tam o' Shantie

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

The 'Chinese Democracy' of rap? Let's hope not. It does seem to finally have a release date now though (August 11th). What are your predictions? The single "New Wu" with a video is online feat Ghostface & Method Man. Not bad, but I'm not blown away. Then again, nobody with an IQ over 20 should expect this album to be a patch on its classic namesake. It would be nice if it was half decent though :up:

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

Raekwon - New Wu first official track released from the album as far as i can make out, don't think it's an actual single yet though.

listened to it once, thought it was alright. listened to it again today and now I think it's the fuckin tits.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Guest Tam o' Shantie

Much though Cuban Linx isn't perfect, I think it pips liquid swords on overall quality. LS is consistent as hell but the CL bangers are untouchable. GZA's most recent album is actually not half bad and a lot of it wouldn't sound entirey out of place alongside liquid swords, in my honest opinion. Best wu output that I've heard since No Said Date and probably better than it too.

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  • 3 weeks later...
Guest Tam o' Shantie

Surprise, surprise.

Date: 01 Jul 2009, 03:59

Subject: ANNOUCEMENT! ANNOUNCEMENT! ANNOUNCEMENT! ANNOUNCEMENT!

Body: PEACE YALL, IM SORRY TO TELL YA BUT THE ALBUM HAS BEEN PUSHED BACK TO SEPT 8TH DUE TO SAMPLE CLEARANCES AND LEAKAGE OF ONE OF MY RECORDS. I KNOW YALL BEEN WAITING PATIENTLY ON THIS JOINT. BUT DO THE SAMPLES NOT BEING CLEARED IN TIME I HAD NO CHOICE TO PUSH IT BACK COUPLE WEEKS SO I CAN GIVE YALL THE BEST PRODUCT I CAN POSSIBLY PUT OUT! DEF SORRY FOR THIS SITUATION BUT THIS IS THE BUSINESS! BUT I GOT A NEW VATICAN MIXTAPE COMING OUT RIGHT BEFORE THE ALBUM SOMETHING SPECIAL SOME OF THE RECORDS THAT DIDNT MAEKT EH ALBUM PEOPLE. BUT HOLD ME DOWN YALLL

ONE!

RAEKWON

*edit*

PS, new artwork - look familiar?

l_1219269059f94c60ac55142162bc88f8.jpg

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  • 4 weeks later...
Guest Tam o' Shantie

The tracklisting for Raekwon's highly-anticipated Only Built For Cuban Linx 2 album has leaked online revealing each song and the emcee's guest features.

Providing fans with over 24 cuts, the title tracks will reflect similar subjects as his first release.

Only Built For Cuban Linx 2: "Return To The North Star" featuring Papa Wu, "House of Flying Daggers" featuring Inspectah Deck, Ghostface Killah & Method Man, "Sonny's Missing," "Pyrex Vision," "Cold Outside" featuring Suga Bang & Ghostface Killah, "New Wu" featuring Method Man & Ghostface Killah, "Penitentiary" featuring Ghostface Killah, "Criminology 09" featuring Ghostface Killah, "Fat Lady Sings," "Canal Street," "10 Bricks" featuring Cappadonna & Ghostface Killah, "Rockstar" featuring Inspectah Deck & GZA, "Catalina" featuring Busta Rhymes, "40 Deuce" featuring Jadakiss & Styles P, "Walk Wit Me," "We Will Rob You" featuring Slick Rick, GZA & Masta Killah, "Have Mercy" featuring Beanie Sigel, "Surgical Gloves," "N*gga Me," "Mean Streets" featuring Inspectah Deck, "Kiss The Ring" featuring Inspectah Deck & Masta Killah, "Ason Jones." (2DopeBoyz)

Raekwon announced the project's first single would debut within two weeks.

"We gonna be dropping the motherf*cking single, I'm telling y'all now, look at me," he said in a video last weekend. "We dropping the single in approximately ten days. Ten days from now...You like the song, it's all good. You don't like it, that's all good too. I ain't expecting everybody to like anything and everything, just keep it real with yourself. But at the end of the day, I feel good about it. I feel good about the movement, I feel good about that y'all able to get this motherf*cking record and yo man, just visualize the audio man." (IceWaterTV)

Rae recently confirmed fans Ghostface Killah, who played a prominent role in the original disc, would also contribute to the album's follow-up.

"This is me going back without a record deal," Raekwon described in an interview with Angie Martinez. "I ain't care about the radio, I ain't care about none of that. All I cared about was giving y'all something that I felt was from the heart and putting together that poisonous production. We got an all-star production crew on it. We got RZA, we got Dre, we got Pete Rock, we got Marley Marl, we got Erick Sermon, we got Alchemist. They all wanted to get down...We got them all to come in, make a robot to challenge RZA's production. So these dudes are like another Voltron that came together on the production tip...They made me go back to straight up Champion hoody and dirty Timbs again...Ghost is on there, he did what he had to do for me. He's still doing his thing over there with the Def Jam thing so we had to fix a few things so he could -- that's corny to me, but like, I gotta respect it because I know when Wu-Tang first came into the game, we all said we were gonna go do our own dolo thing." (Hot 97)

Originally slated to drop next month, Rae recently said his new LP would hit retail stores in September.

"Peace yall just seen the last visual of the Walk wit me video and its classic," he wrote Monday (July 6). "will be giving ya a teaser real soon! In the booth just recording some new records ya know i might drop 3lps before this yrs out i got to catch up But its bout OB4CL2 RIGHT NOW! Im just putting myself back where i belong! And that on Top! Yea but who heard bout that Mef, GHOST & RAE ALBUM, wht ya think bout that! ... Sept 8, the album will be out, but im on my way to nyc im shooting 2 more videos this week yall im doing this album for the fans!" (Raekwon's Twitter)

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Guest Tam o' Shantie
I really really wanted to like Cuban Linx, but I just don't think it comes close to comparing to GZA's Liquid Swords. Heck, I even prefer the first Bobby Digital record.

I really need to give it another few tries, but it just did nothing for me when I got it.

Just read this...this is utter fucking blasphemy...B.Digital In Stereo really is a huge steaming turd on the chest of the (at the time) generally amazing Wu legacy. What the fuck made RZA think that the kind of people who listened to 36 Chambers wanted to hear his brainless rhymes over the whitest beats ever committed to tape? Part of RZA's charm is his 'mad scientist' intellect, second only to the Genius.

Anyway, the album's out today. Unfortunately I don't know if play.com will send it to me in time. I held a copy of it yesterday in 1up and there are some pretty big name producers on it...surprise surprise, only 1 (or possibly 2) actually produced by the RZA - because his involvement in the original is so easy to disregard, right? Other appearances from J.Dilla, Dr.Dre, Alchemist, Erick Sermon, Necro, Scram Jones (surely a career highlight?) and a worrying amount from some dude called BT...unfortunately the CDs themselves were down in the office and my mole couldn't go down and get them. So, I welcome your input in the meantime.

PS three white guys behind the boards...makes me uneasy

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

that's what EQ's for brah...

right, the CD is in my hands right now. annoyingly my aqua teen hunger force DVD didn't arrive, instead I get some big budget crummy movie called 'escape from huang shi' with chow yun fat. back to the album though, i'll be bumping it at lunchtime in my 'whip' let's see how it holds up on a very quick listen.

PS. bass in hip hop hop? i can see why you're outraged!

PPS if ya hate questionably mixed bassy hip hop, stay away from return to 36 chambers...it makes cuban linx sound like a philharmonic orchestra recording

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

ok, had a 5 min scan through the tracks at lunch

cuban linx part 2 this aint (well, literarily it is...but audibly it isn't)

the beats by and large are fairly soft. sparse, hard hitting kicks/snare beats have been scrapped in favour of gentle percussion & sweeping strings more reminiscent of the kind of shit that ghostface prefers to spit over. couple of slow tracks that didnt make much of an impression on me. by and large this appears to be quite a melodic album. alchemist's contribution only makes me realise how much some of the other producers are aping him.

rae promised coke raps but one thing has just struck me - on the original cuban linx he and ghost really did sound like they'd just snorted half a kilo, and I dont really doubt it for a second (gimmicky song intro or not, 'knowledge god' implies that they were doing exactly that in the vocal booth!). by comparison, these days rae just sounds half baked most of the time. so what i'm getting at is the overall mood is far less aggressive, not surprising since he's now pushing 40.

HOWEVER on first listen, it sounds like a fairly decent effort. i've personally waited a while for this to drop, so I owe it to the chef to listen to this album properly from start to finish, and that's what i intend to do. I dont buy a lot of modern rap albums, becuase they tend to sound more like this than 1995's cuban linx, but we'll see how this particular example pans out.

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Just read this...this is utter fucking blasphemy...B.Digital In Stereo really is a huge steaming turd on the chest of the (at the time) generally amazing Wu legacy. What the fuck made RZA think that the kind of people who listened to 36 Chambers wanted to hear his brainless rhymes over the whitest beats ever committed to tape? Part of RZA's charm is his 'mad scientist' intellect, second only to the Genius.
PS. bass in hip hop hop? i can see why you're outraged!

PPS if ya hate questionably mixed bassy hip hop, stay away from return to 36 chambers...it makes cuban linx sound like a philharmonic orchestra recording

How gratuitously patronising. Who'd have thought someone could critic certain aspects of records you like? Pipe down.

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

How gratuitously hypocritical...you criticise an album I like by saying an album you like is better than it...yet if I express my opinion towards the album you say is better than the one I like, I'm at fault?

I know he is your bandmate and therefore you want to defend him but I was being fairly tongue-in-cheek with my response to him. However I don't think I'm the only person who would agree that bass, excessive or not, is a fairly essential staple of hip hop production. So though I understand where he is coming from, I don't think you can really ever complain about the fact that hip hop has too much bass. Furthermore, since I have no idea whether or not he has heard it and based on the fact that Cuban Linx' production ruined the listening experience for him, I thought I'd mention the fact that Ol' Dirty Bastard's first album really does take the messy bass sound of Cuban Linx to a far greater level to the point that I usually have to roll off the bass on my car stereo so that my speakers stop wobbling.

So why not remove Lucky Rathen's scrotum from your mouth, read my post again and then pipe down yerself? Better yet, why not contribute something towards the discussion of the new Raekwon album, since that's what this thread is about.

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Guest Tam o' Shantie
It was also the way you responded to me. It's not hypocritical, because when we expressed our opinions, we weren't being condescending bell ends about it.

ROFL, don't take it personally that I hate RZA's album. Just accept that I have a colourful opinion about the man's work. For a guy like me who adores the hardcore kung fu beats that the man created in that golden age of 93-96 or so, hearing Bobby Digital In Stereo is a shocking and disappointing experience.

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that's what EQ's for brah...

right, the CD is in my hands right now. annoyingly my aqua teen hunger force DVD didn't arrive, instead I get some big budget crummy movie called 'escape from huang shi' with chow yun fat. back to the album though, i'll be bumping it at lunchtime in my 'whip' let's see how it holds up on a very quick listen.

PS. bass in hip hop hop? i can see why you're outraged!

PPS if ya hate questionably mixed bassy hip hop, stay away from return to 36 chambers...it makes cuban linx sound like a philharmonic orchestra recording

I don't have a problem with bass, but I find with Cuban Linx the bass and the track in general are louder than the vocals. For my money, the most important thing about hip hop and the bit I enjoy most is the lyrics. The track and the beat aren't a big selling point for me. In Cuban Linx I struggle to hear what Raekwon is actually rapping about because the track is too loud and the vocals too quiet, so all you can hear is the bass. Tical is guilty of this in places as well, it's got thumping beats but I can't hear what Method Man is actually saying.

I know you're not a huge fan of Notorious BIG, or the way his records were produced (I seem to recall you mentioning 'weak' production), but I enjoy Biggie's records more cos I can actually hear the story. Just my opinions like, for what it's worth.

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Guest Tam o' Shantie

Wtf has that got to do with Cuban linx? And I don't think I'm alone in disliking 'shiny suit' rap, sean combs' production was one of the largest nails in hip hop's coffin. Life after death is filled with corny production. And it's a weak album by and large.

Anyway at 24 tracks I didn't manage to listen all the way through ob4cl2 yet, but I'm really enjoying it. A lot of the songs are SHORT! Pete Rock should be shot for his horrible beat which is so overkill on the high eq and compression that the snare and hihat is basically White noise. For shame! Rae also has too many slow songs going on, obviously hoping that people will spin his album tracks in southern rap sets!

Ghostface made me laugh out loud in one of the songs talking about getting his Wang sucked, can't remember the track though.

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Guest Tam o' Shantie
Soz wen i think of biggie i think more of his 1st album & the tracks i lyk; Gimme the Loot, Warning, Unbelievable etc plus Who Shot Ya? is co produced by puff & dats a hard track, prolly d otha guy did all d work!

Yeah you still had primo, easy mo bee and a few others on that first album, puffy's input was excusable though - I'd even say that juicy is my favourite track. Pity biggie's rhymes were still improving. I think a high percentage of life after death is garbage though, I'd go as far to say a majority. Its just the Corny pop rap beats that spoil it though... By contrast 'kick in the door' is absolute fire, and '10 crack commandments isn't far off.

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