ALBUM REVIEWS

Kurupt
Space Boogie
Pias Recordings
@www.vanguard-online.co.uk

 Drop the laser on the disc, lie back and listen... here comes Kurupt... 'Take a hit of this shit', he tells us then describes an all-black space colony of peace. I'm thinking 'yeah, George Clinton' in anticipation as a heavy funk beat, dragging one foot, introduces the lyric 'I'm like, fuck a bitch and fuck you too'. Nice! Peace! Nate Dogg joins us to explain how he has to live ruff to survive, before sidetracking to tell us he does what the fuck he wants to. The next track, Hate On Me, uses a banging backbeat to slam hate. Using hate words to do this like 'bitches' and 'I change ho's like I change clothes seems a bit of a headstretch. In On Da Grind Daz helps rap over a big easy sploping relaxed slap-bass smiling number. Probably as well for my enjoyment that I couldn't catch many lyrics. It's Over is a catalogue of what the gangsta needs for the highlife - Bentley, Remy, Goretex(!). Sad, the tune, like others, is from the top drawer of the P-Funk catalogue. Can't Go Wrong has a deeply funky bass, sax riff and gunshot effects. Spoilt by the infantile lyricism - 'we stab ho's in the bladder'. L'il 1/2 Dead contributes to On, Onsite - 'Niggaz act like they don't get with me, when they see me onsite. I don't give a shit you bitch, cos I'm a gangsta for life'. Sums it up really. There is some deeply funky music on here and evidence of a cosmically weed-inflected P-Funk vision but it's wrecked by the pre-adolescent ravings of a misogynistic, homophobic playground bully. In Kuruption (the theme song?) Everlast and Kurupt tell us the oppressed need guns to defend themselves from the corrupt and fucked up government. Maybe true but should guns be in the hand of someone who says 'most of your niggaz is worse than bitches' - who'd you think he's going to use that gun on? Listen up Kurupt, your belief systems are hateful and instead of hating the people who keep others down you cut up on the already oppressed like you're the biggest dog in the dog pound. And you know your space peace colony? Every Trekkie'll tell you you can't use guns on a spaceship so how're you going to get to be top dog?

Have I picked this up wrong? Is it polemic? Documentary? Fiction? Narrative poetry? Is it intended to be cathartic or to incense? Whatever, unlike a lot of rock, I actually actively listened to this, trying to catch each lyric. Seems to me that's one of the appeals. Repeated listening to catch and learn the words so they can be reshaped, reused. What do you think? Write to us at Vanguard Online.

Ross McGibbon