Saturday, July 26, 2008

Kool Moe Dee's Lost LL Diss

After his long run with Jive, and his brief but prolific stint with Wrap/Ichiban (two albums in the same year ain't bad), Kool Moe Dee came out with one last record. "Love Love" came out on Spoiled Brat Records, a label best known for putting out some spotty Kool Keith records before people realized just how bad he was falling off. They also put out obscure comeback releases by Father MC, Three X Dope, and the Krown Rulers. I mean, any label that spells the artist's name wrong (see the pic) pretty much speaks for itself.

But "Love Love" is actually pretty ok. Despite what its title suggests, it's no love song; just straight, hardcore freestyle rhymes mixed with a little Stop the Violence message. He uses a lot of fast, playful short rhymes to showcase his skills. You won't be blown away or anything, but it's enough to remind you why he was such a highly respected lyricist back in the day. This song's like a cross between "Death Blow" and "New Rap Language," though not quite as good as either of those: "mad heads want that rah-rah, but uh-uh; I'm like the papa - The Idi Amin Dada, cut ears off with the mic; I'll kill rah rah with la-la, like Fugees did 'Fugee-La,' that rah rah I can't feel ya, so I will be like 'see ya!' My ether makes me the born king so I will be the impeccable rhyme speaker, drop missles like heat seekers." The beat is also no doubt meant to be reminiscent of his James Brown-heavy LL diss, with a similar drum track a simple bassline and a sample which is basically exactly the same as the signature "Death Blow" horn stabs, but played on a keyboard (I'm guessing).

Did I mention LL dissing? Yeah... the real reason most of you will probably want to seek this out is the b-side. It's got a 70's Cold Crush-style hook and an old school, hardcore beat. And he sounds angry: "to me the microphone is like a razor blade in prison." The first verse is kind of a generic battle rhyme, but verse two starts with an LL quote, "What the uh? I thought I conquered the world! Crushed Moe Dee, Hammer and Ice-T;" and it's on from there:

"Who the hell you crush? What?
You can't touch the god.
Come on, let's keep it real; You know I crushed ya, Todd.
You're trying to hit the new heads with hip-hop fallacies;
But in reality, you wouldn't battle me.
The stage was set, the money was up,
I placed my money and said 'what?'
And like a bee-otch, we watched the girlie come up out ya;
Heads know about ya, old heads can vouch for
The facts of your fiction ciphered in your diction;
You're just talking shit like a jaded politician.
Say you're rippin', ain't nothin' different;
You want the whippin'? I'll step in the house where ya livin',
And do it on TV, so people can see me,
Wreck you in your own house - make it easy.
While you're frontin', you don't want none;
You never had a battle;
Your mic is like a rattle.
Your style is goo goo gah gah,
But you know you do nada;
You talk it like it's rah rah,
But we know you're pooh nah nah.
Fourteen shots to the dome?
You'll get your spot blown;
I'm talking after dark where it's not shown.
I'm talkin' rhyme time on straight up prime time,
Where men do battles on mics in places that you can't find!"

...And he keeps going, ripping LL 'till the end of the song.

Spoiled Brat records had some very limited, unusual distribution, so they can be pretty hard to track down. But fortunately, not a lot of heads know about this one - or were checking for Moe Dee during that era - so the few that are out there are usually pretty inexpensive. Get it cheap while you can.

Oh, and by the way, Kool Moe Dee is apparently working on a comeback album called Return of the King on Platinum Diamond Records. You can hear tracks off of it on his myspace page. Of course, it says it will be out on 2007... so that might be the only way you'll get to hear it. The production kinda sucks anyway.

9 comments:

  1. Thats dope. Would like to hear these.

    Just one thing on the lyrics transcription...

    It should probably be "Idi Amin Dada" not "Idi I mean Dada" :-)

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idi_Amin

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  2. Oops!  I reckon you're right.  Fix't.  ;)

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  3. Does anybody know the name of this b-said track?

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  4. Wow, great entry.  This is why I keep coming back to this block.  So many obscure releases have fallen through the cracks -- but Werner keeps finding 'em.  

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  5. Ok...  here's little treat for those of you who read my comments:
    I've seen this sold online a couple of times kinda pricey; but right now there's a guy selling sealed copies of this 12" for 3.99 each - or best offer! - on EBay.  Just do a search for "Kool Moe (yes, his listing spells Mo with the E) Dee Love" and it'll pop right up under EBay stores.  As I write this, he has 2 copies left.
    Like I wrote in my post, "Get it cheap while you can."  :-D

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  6. kool keith falling off???? never...yous a hater ...let me guess you like eminem?

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  7. No, Eminem has also fallen off.

    Seriously, you don't see a drastic drop in quality between Keith's early material (Ultramagnetic's first 3 albums, Cenobites, etc) and his later stuff (Matthew, Spankmaster, Diesel Truckers, Ultramagnetics' comeback album, Dr. Octagon II, etc)?

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  8. i notice he comes with diffrent styles but fallen off??? if anything hes releasing alot more quality work...its just diffrent...fall off is when u dont do what u used to do and keith still droppen records left and rite...soem rappers try releasing same sound over and over and they get tired (nas)......others, like keith, keep it fresh and new for the fans

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  9. Well, I'll definitely give you that he hasn't slowed down and that he's changed.  But, to me, when he brags about having written stuff like the Sex Styles album in 1 day it SOUNDS like he wrote the whole thing in 1 day, which isn't a good thing.  It hasn't helped that he hasn't worked with a good producer in a long time (IMHO) either.
    But, hey, it's cool to see he still has supporters.  If you haven't already, you should check out the Cenobites EP that was just released (I wrote about it a few posts back) - it has a pretty nice, marathon Keith verse over a hot Godfather Don track on the last song.

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