During my childhood and into my young adult life I went through various phases music wise. Rap music was one of those phases, but it wasn't a case of just listening to the entire genre so to speak. It began with Eminem, then those associated with Eminem such as Dr Dre, then more West Coast rap and then at some point it was any rap I found good.
There came a point when my rap phase was over, but amazingly one rap act I didn't listen to during that phase was the featured act in this post, Jurassic 5. There came a point in my life though where I was no longer committed to a specific genre, and that's when I started listening to Jurassic 5.
A lot of rap music had become less about the struggles of growing up in a rough part of the world and more about bragging about how much money they now had and how they were "pimping it up in the club". Jurassic 5 were never about that though, they were as they put it "all about the beats and the lyrics".
Another thing I liked was the fact they are a group and the dynamic they have as a group comes through on the record. The reality is that a decent producer can make a poor rapper a good tune, and a bad producer can make a good rapper a crap tune. Jurassic 5 had Cut Chemist and DJ Nu-Mark to take care of that, who are both great at what they do.
Then you have the 4 rappers, yes confusingly there are 6 members of Jurassic 5. Who is the stand out rapper? Well none of them really, it's all about how they rap together.
What this album taught me is that to make a good rap record, you don't need to claim to be the best rapper in the world, you don't need the who's who of good producers, you don't need to swear all the time and you don't need to go to war with other rappers.
Whilst it's not gangsta rap though, it's not your cheesy Will Smith type nonsense either. The lyrics do have a few expletives, they have a message with the tunes. But the emphasis is on the music, and that's the whole point of music at the end of the day.
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