Well, when I say "unheard," I mean unheard by all of you. I've actually owned two of the three tracks on my unreleased Omniscence promo tape since the 90s. To save you the intensive labor of clicking that link, here's what I had to say about those songs:
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3. "My Main Man" - The first verse of this is featured on the mixtape; but on the tape it's a full song with three verses. It's another smooth track, and has Omniscence reminiscing on his past with his best friend. He's not really doing the punchline thing here (well, he still does a little, with lines like "I remember when I had no status; but you still backed me up like the Pips did Gladys"), but his MCing is still unquestionably nice. It also features some nice scratching on the outro.
6. "When I Make Parole" - This one is a surprise. First of all, for the record, it's not on that mixtape. Secondly, despite having another smooth instrumental, Omni kicks a surprisingly harder flow here, but it actually works. His voice is rougher, he sounds angrier, and his lyrics are definitely more street:
"I'm so incredibly criminal minded;
Puffin' that angel dust got me blinded.
Rush up on the spot with my glock on cock,
Crack rock bustin' out the side of my sock.
Stumblin' up the block,
Yo, I see this devil bitch;
Yeah, just enough to make my trigger finger itch.
'Excuse me, miss,
Do you got the time?'
Smack her in the grill with the steel-piece nine!
Gimme the jewels and the butter-soft leather.
Should I let her live, or should I fuckin' wet 'er?
Click click boom!
Gun shots to her chest;
Situation critical, I'm dippin' to the rest.
Mom duke's flippin' 'bout the rumors:
I'm goin' 'round town, rollin' with my crew, givin' out brain tumors!"
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And it's just so awesome now that everybody else finally gets to hear those songs! And to have them as fresh vinyl copies with their instrumentals to boot.
Of course, for myself, it's the third track that's the most exciting, since that one's completely new to my ears along with the rest of you guys. It's called "Nuff Love" and is a real crowd pleaser. I'm already seeing online responses saying Pt. 2 is even better than the first. It's certainly everything you'd expect from a vintage Omni track: a cool, vibe-heavy (a la "Maintain") instrumental with a mellow shouted (yes, that's a possible combination) chorus. Omni brings plenty of punchlines ("you may be live, but the vandals are much liver; we beat you worse than they did that white truck driver"*), but never crosses the line to schticky.
Actually, "completely new to [our] ears" is a bit of an overstatement. If you've ever downloaded one of those bootleg Raw Factor mixes online [read my interview with Omniscence for the story behind those], you've heard this track before, paired with the made-up title "Love To the Crews." Of course, that was all hissy and crappy. The sound quality here is far superior; plus again it's on vinyl and comes with the instrumental version.
It goes without saying at this point, as a release from Dope Folks, it's limited to 350 copies and reasonably priced. It should also go without saying that this is an absolute essential for any Omniscence fan, featuring three tracks, all top shelf, released for the first time ever. This is what we've waited all these years for.
*Meaning Reginald Denny, for all you younger heads out there.
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