NWA
The record which kindled my interest here is "EFIL 4 ZAGGIN". At the time I completely missed out on N.W.A. My brother had "Straight Out of Compton", but it didn't really appeal to me. Just the other day I heard it for the first time and it completely blew me away. This is an utterly seductive, brutally compelling sound which Dre achieves. In fact it transpires it's widely viewed as his production masterpiece. "The Chronic" I did have, but that's nothing on this. By that stage the G-funk sound, put crudely an update on George Clinton's synth funk, is utterly cliched. To a fan of Hardcore-era Jungle it's the gigantic, pulverising breakbeats which are so remarkable.
What people object to with "EFIL 4 ZAGGIN" however is its lyrical content, and particularly the misogyny. When Ice Cube left, probably as a reaction to his assumed worthiness, the remaining crew became as plain nasty as they could. Among the topics touched upon are gang-banging a fourteen-year old Vicar's daughter and murdering a prostitute in a drive-by. There are moments when the women appear to get their own back, a poor shmuck phones his "bitch" from jail telling her to come and collect him, she answers thinking it's another of her boyfriends then hangs up, he rather pathetically pretending to the prisoners waiting behind him in the queue to abrogate her, hiding the fact that the line is dead. But mainly this a war of the sexes with one very cruel winner.
What marks a lot of the great Mid-Period Hip-Hop on the other hand is an even-handedness when it comes to women. There are moments of nastiness, for instance Gang Starr's "Ex Girl to Next Girl", which I've always thought exceptionally callous, though perhaps tempered by Guru's alleged homosexuality. But for instance Main Source's "Looking at the front door" is a painful, even tender account of how the rapper is made to feel stupid by his girlfriend, Pharcyde's "Passin' Me By" deals with unrequited love, and even Double XX Posse's majestic "Not Going To Be Able To Do It" involves a discourse with women, even if it details a breakdown in communications. It aint all Strippers and Hoes! Women are beautiful, worshipped and though sex is often illicit it's still fun, for instance on Ed O.G's "Bug A Boo" or Finesse and Smooth's "Strictly for the Ladies". On one level it all seems hopelessly charming (I can't pretend otherwise, ha!) but, really, nice.