By young h  |  Send to Friend

For just over a decade now there has been a war brewing between art and commerce as the business model of the '90s debatably spearheaded by Bad Boy Records and emulated by countless others continues to affect Hip-Hop’s climate to this day. Where many forefathers who paid dues and laid ground for today’s MCs were never duly compensated for their contributions, it ‘s now par for the course to see  “talent” cash in on any combination of good timing, a catchy song on the radio and the right marketing scheme. Casual followers of music generally accept the changes as they happen, while purists and rappers from the old school fret over the direction in which things are headed, doubly conscious of the culture’s former beauty and present mutation. With careers that took off at a time when originality was lauded in comparison to the homogeneous state of modern day radio, Busta Rhymes, Method Man and Redman hope to still be received with considerable favor as their  respective new albums Back On My B.S. and Blackout! 2 have just been released.

The Native Tongue collective as a whole was never fortunate enough for most of its members to stay within the public eye or rise to mainstream levels of saturation after its dissolution, but extended family member Busta Rhymes has a star power that has outlasted many who have come and gone. Two decades after his introduction with Leaders Of The New School, Busta has worked with producers from each end of the spectrum including Swizz Beatz, Pharrell, Timbaland, Scott Storch, Puffy, Jay Dee (Dilla), DJ Scratch, and Dr. Dre, all the way up to recent trendsetter Ron Browz. Armed with an arsenal of flows and  energies from raucous to calm, Busta has collaborated with the likes of hardcore M.O.P. to  pop sensations The Pussycat Dolls and just about anyone else to make a mark in urban culture since his arrival. He is generally enamored with the process of making music, and a chameleon never afraid to reinvent himself when necessary, so as to blend in with Hip-Hop’s rotating cast of flash in the pan successes. Busta’s latest offering Back On My B.S. was precluded by last year’s single “Throw The Water On ‘Em” and the recent I Bullsh*t You Not mixtape, both of which found him catering to the whims of listeners who espouse the virtue of authenticity. But staying afloat in today’s rap game often means heeding corporate interests, and the final product available for retail purchase is a carefully calculated package of songs nearly devoid of surprises or experimentation. Back on My B.S. is an exercise in predictability, with the autotune trend heavily showcased and guest appearances from the ubiquitous Lil Wayne and T-Pain as well as present radio darlings Jamie Foxx, T.I. and Akon to name a few. Whether it was a conscious decision to shun the less beaten path to gain accessibility to the masses is anyone’s guess, but Busta’s latest foray is sure to cause bewilderment as he no longer seems to be marching to the beat of his own drum at this phase of his career.

 Brothers in buddha Method Man & Redman have drawn inevitable comparisons to Cheech & Chong, breaking out from their respective Wu-Tang and Def Squad crews to become household names and a unified entity through ventures like the buddy movie How High and their short lived sitcom. As two of the longest remaining acts on Def Jam, the duo’s trajectory has seen the label go from being run by Russell Simmons & Lyor Cohen all the way through the recent leadership of rapper turned executive Jay-Z & longtime industry veteran L.A. Reid.  The decidedly gritty pair survived through Hip-Hop’s jiggy era and are now holding on for dear life as the South has risen to prominence ( Rick Ross’s recent LP Deeper Than Rap almost assuredly received a larger promotional budget from Def Jam than Method Man & Redman), but Blackout! 2 sacrifices nothing in the way of the quality their core audience has come to expect. Redman’s zany side is the yin to the yang of Method Man’s serious demeanor, the two complementing each other as the album’s “if it aint broke, don’t fix it” ethos manifests in hard hitting odes to marijuana and the battle raps that they have come to be renowned for. Never neglecting times past, they bring Keith Murray along for the ride on “Errbody Scream” and even manage to sound at home with Bun B on the southern tinged “City Lights”. Blackout! 2 serves as an effortless reassurance that Method Man & Redman haven’t lost sight of their fundamentals despite the ever changing state of the music business and its effects on many of their peers.

 Busta Rhymes as a solo artist and Method Man & Redman as a group present different sides of the same coin when viewing the struggle for artists who want to shape the times under the watch of corporate machinations. On one side, Busta still presents the music that’s in his heart on street releases, but the album Back On My B.S. attempts reaching an audience that may have no respect or regard for his long standing legacy as one of urban music’s most creative geniuses. The other side finds Method Man & Redman who don’t seem to be under pressure to have a hit single or big selling album on Def Jam, with an album that makes comparably far less concessions in Blackout! 2.