Wu-Tang Clan: Chamber Music

Ominous string instruments.  Bootleg kung fu movie samples.  Wisdom cautiously spilling from the sealed lips of ancient martial arts masters.  Sword strikes.  Track titles like “Supreme Architecture” and “Kill Too Hard.” Yes!  Just when autotune was declared war upon by the likes of King Jiggamayne, this secret second roundhouse to the loudmouth of rap wackness is released to the masses, and these legendary beasts from the east are unleashed to feast on beats that sound like they were saved from The Flood that almost crumbled The Dream.  RZA is damn near the peak of his artistry once again.  Pay attention, grasshoppers and hipsters.

The first track naturally is called “Redemption” (peace to Mr. X-citement).  Then comes the majestic horns.  And then comes some intriguingly relevant vocal samples speaking hip hop history through kung fu commentary.  Gotta love it:“It was long ago, but he’s never forgotten that day.   nd you’re his only hope to redeem the Clan, and retrieve our army!”  “When you learn, you’ll know not to make those mistakes.”

Inspectah Deck rips open the guts of the album, refreshingly sticking to his pistols, instead of trying to keep up with the young guns.  Not “For Heaven’s Sake” level, but flashbacks of “the Lone Ranger/ code red: DANGER!” MC that we first fell in love with.  It’s been a long time. Wu shouldn’t have left you.  Yes, 8 Diagrams wasn’t exactly what most people were looking for, but if you are the kind of head who seeks the vintage sound of the Supreme Shaolin Ceremony Masters of the 90’s, then your wish has been officially granted by the RZArecta.  Brooklyn soul band The Revelations also flesh out the fuzzy and dusty but digital grit whipped up in the pyrex pot of Prince Rakeem, embellishing each track with live instrumentation that does nothing but make everything sound much more authentic and fucking awesome.  Andrew Kelley, Noah Rubin, and M.O.P.’s Lil’ Fame also provide soundscape support, with Fizzy Womack surprising the most of all, contributing to seven of the album’s seventeen sinister selections.  It’s never really clear who actually does what, but it’s clear that what they are all doing collectively, is returning to the feel of the 36th Chamber like it is 1993 all over again, but not rehashing the rap madness that set it all off.  They simply carry on tradition like super ninjas on a mission: save 2009 hip hop from bullshit.  They succeed with flying colors and bloody shurikens.

So, after Deck gets finished slicing the song open, a gruff ass U-God bodies the beat (I guess RZA and U-God worked that alleged unpaid debt situation out, thank goodness).  Then Baby-U passes the mic to… Masta Ace?  Ill.  And even though Ace’s verse isn’t exactly mindblowing, it’s still lovely to hear these three veterans rhyme together over a moody organ riff and some chunky drums, radioplay be damned.  We don’t need no hook, word to Shaq Diesel.  Half the songs on this album don’t stop for an obvious refrain.  Babies ain’t getting fed steak here; this is raw dog hip hop.  Most of the songs aren’t longer than 3 minutes, but they are mostly filled with straight spitting.  Suuu!

Next up, Ghostface Killah, AZ, and The Rebel INS all jump on a party rocker together that finds Pretty Toney invigorated like it’s Ironman time again.  Nice.  But with him raising the energy bar that high, the subdued and laid back wordplay wizardry of Anthony Cruz doesn’t impress as much, only because Ghost Deini being amped on a track is usually the highlight, to the detriment of anyone else on the song.  It works well enough, regardless.  AZ is still a sick f*cking MC (that Nasir Escobar needs to make an album with).  What’s more than enough is hearing Raekwon, Cormega and Sean Price get together to write a threatening lecture.  Mega Montana in particular brings the vehicular homicidal rhyme drama:

“Witness savages/ snitching was hazardous/ nowadays shit is embarrassing/ f*ck a flow, this is a lyrical aq..ue… duct”, with that stone jaw Queensbridge slur he spits his bulletproof rhymebook brilliance with.  F*cking Corey.  You rule.  The rib-crushing bassline bobs and weaves in-between the slashing strings and Hollow Bones-huge gunshots that anchor the song to the ocean floor that is the dead rapper disposal for the bodies of the sh*t talkers and haters who doubted these living legends couldn’t still bring the motherf*ckin’ ruckus.

“Cor/ Mega/ raw: forever/ fell back, paused/ fell off? NEVER” Blaow.  Verse: dead.  Song: murdered.  What’s next? Sean Price, on the same beat?  Too much awesome hip hop testosterone for one song.  The line he walks between comedian and criminal is too edutaining to ever deny.  “As you can see, I’m focused/ Boot Camp for life, f*ck the G.I. Joe sh*t”.  Somewhere in the middle of the verse, P spits a syllable sandwich that only the best can manage to handle. Sh*t is magic.

The Abbott interludes (like “Fatal Hesitation” and “One Last Question”, among others) are exactly what needs to be done to take this conceptual project from compilation to a remarkable creation.  RZA shows that he knows exactly what time it is, even if he isn’t doing anything close to what the rest of the rap game is doing right now.  It’s interesting to hear his take on various familiar things, like on “I Wish You Were Here”, where he filters the sample from Consequence and Kanye West’s “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly” for the most soulful slice of Wu-Tang street blues since Isaac Hayes blessed “I Can’t Go To Sleep” on the underloved classic The W.  Soak it in, it’s marvelous.

No GZA, Masta Killa or Method Man rhyme on Chamber Music unfortunately, but the rest of the fam is here.  It will only leave us quenching more on a possible second edition of Chamber Music.  Regardless, all members, some members, or no members, if you want that classic Wu-Tang Clan sh*t, it is right here, f*ck the world.

Raekwon talks about his creative process before the meditative murda muzik of “Ill Figures” like the Kool Genius of Rap and Brownsville’s Finest, M.O.P..  There’s not much to say, the song is equal to the sum of its parts.  Tons of guns.

And straight up: “Free Like ODB” might be one of the best skits ever made.  You gotta hear it.  Repeatedly.

Afterwards, Deck ignites the vocabularic havoc on the ground-rumbling “Sound The Horns,” but honestly, he needed to do a bit more editing before he sparked the lettering.  His sword isn’t quite as sharp as it used to be, but even with a blunted edge, his words cut into the flesh of the track with conviction.  Sadat X comes to life on the second verse and makes greatness out of his Wu collaboration.  And Golden Arms perfectly finishes off the majestic massacre that the song moonlights as.

“Enlightened Statues” finds RZA thinking very deeply on the different paths to enlightenment, and the costs of the fuel transporting your spirit from ignorance to elevation.  The tabla playing textures and shifty percussion cloaks the snippet in open secrecy, as reverberations drip from RZA’s lisp, shrouding his spontaneous explanations in even more mystery.  Almost every skit is somewhat structured like so, and it’s both frustrating and exciting to hear, as you know you won’t understand it all on the first few listens.  But alternately, each one immediately connects something, and what you usually get is exceptional intellect.

And before it’s all said and done, the disciples are blessed with a RZA solo called “NYC Crack.”  A vocal sample as sweet as Blue Raspberry is stitched in between a trembling, countrified guitar lick and a hovering vibration of dark melody dread, as Robert Diggs updates us on the world according to RZA in 2009.  “They only piggyback/ never disrespect/ that Wu-Tang slang is that New York City crack.”  Indeed.

The universal Buddha has spoken to the youth and the older gods living the truth.  The 90′s was a special time, and assembling all these greats together under the Shaolin Island umbrella is a 2009 highlight to cherish and remember. Wu-Tang forever, motherf*ckers.

The saga continues.

88/100

“Radiant Jewels”

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“I Wish You Were Here”

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“NYC Crack”

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