Learn Along With Werner, part 9: One and One More

Several years ago, I blogged about the two records by a somewhat obscure, 90s duo called One and One.  It was actually sort of a secret comeback record for UTFO's Doctor Ice, who signed with a new label (Next Plateau) under a new name with a new, updated style.  The other member was his cousin, and they called themselves Harry Balz and Sonny Boy (Doc = Sonny), which he later changed to Sonny Bumz.  The records were hot, especially their debut single "Phenomenon," but you know Next Plateau wasn't exactly launching careers in the late 90s, so they never got the recognition they deserved, and they just had the two records.

...Or so I always thought.  But recently I got to have another one of those awesome moments where the internet showed me a record I never knew existed back in my day.  Apparently, before signing to Next Plateau, they pressed up their lead single independently, and used that to get industry attention.  It makes sense, as that's exactly what Doc Ice had done just a couple years prior, releasing his first solo comeback single on his own label, Rely On Selph Records, before getting it picked up on Wrap/ Ichiban and coming out with his second solo album.  It's actually pretty impressive that Ice could keep resetting his career and with a single 12" get a new record deal, considering most rappers go their whole careers struggling to get signed once.  But even if you don't like his style, think he's too old school or maybe some of his humor's corny; that guy's an undeniably talented MC.  And so here we have "Phenomenon" by One and One on a little label owned by Tyrone Thomas called Streets Of Sound Records.

So, "big deal," I hear you say.  "A rare, early pressing of the same single that came out wider a little later on?  Maybe you can get your collector jollies on, but otherwise it's just the same song, right?"  And it is.  I listened to them back to back, and the it's not even an alternate rough mix or anything.  "Phenomenon" is exactly the same, including the spoken intro.  It even features the same four versions: Radio, Album, Instrumental and Accapella.  But this original, indie pressing has something the later records haven't got: an exclusive B-side.

So forever, I thought One and One only had three songs to their name (well, unless you count that weird, Absolut vodka compilation album).  But no, there's a fourth!  And by the way, this record also teaches us something else very interesting.  The Next Plateau single always credited the production of "Phenomenon" to Swing Of Things Productions, whoever the heck that was.  But this early record label spells it out; it's Mark Spark, along with a partner named Hasan Pore.  And they produced both the tracks on this 12".  And the instrumental's on here, too, for those wondering; though it's more of a TV track.

So how's the new song?  It's cool.  It's definitely not clear to me why Next Plateau didn't choose to include it.  I mean "Phenomenon" definitely stands out as the cut that could really make noise in '96; but both are solid tracks; there's definitely no reason to bury "What's On Your Mind."  It's got some cool, moody production.  And it's a relationship song, but it's much closer to "Looking At the Front Door" than some pop love rap.  It's about the frustration of not being sure what your partner's really thinking even when she's saying all the right things.  Is she really cheating on you or just doesn't want to see you?  Doc does his first verse from the perspective of a man in jail writing to his woman at home, and he ends with a pure sex brag.  The whole record is on a surprisingly street tip you never would've expected from the UTFO guy in a lab coat and stethoscope.  Werner approves.

...And One

...One and One returned in 1997 with their second single, "My Soul" on Next Plateau.  It's another quality cut with an essence that's pure, vintage 90's.  It's a little slower, more of a smooth song than the rugged, energetic "Phenomenon," which for me makes it less compelling.  But I suppose your mileage will vary there, depending on your personal tastes - if you're the type that's always seeking out those Midnight Marauders/ The Roots-type cuts, this may be more up your alley.  But, whichever side of that fence you fall on, it's still a quality, respectable song.  They flip another great sample ("Tell Me This Is a Dream" by The Delfonics), which has been jacked by a couple other artists since, but it sounds great here.

And unlike their previous single, this one makes with the remixes.  First up is the Soul Mix, which isn't bad either.  It's got some heavy bass notes and a cool, mellow vibe.  The downside is that it all sounds a little too studio-crafted... which is to say that the music all sounds like it was programmed and created with studio equipment, as opposed to rich samples (or live instrumentation, of course).  So, it's okay... sort of like the 12" single version of album filler, but for the most part, you're going to want to stick with the original.

That's followed up by The Boogie Mix, which embellishes the R&B... all the versions have a little uncredited singing on the hook; but on this mix, she croons constantly in the background, it's more pronounced on the hook.  The music is more traditionally "R&B"ish, too, with sparse piano notes and another soft keyboard loop.  The whole venture just has more of an early Video Soul groove.

Flip it over and you've got Instrumentals for the Album and Soul Mixes; and, better still, you get a B-side song called ""Didn't I."  This is a pretty cool and harder track.  It's built around another Delfonics tune, this time (obviously) "Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)."  They even have a girl singing a variation of their chorus for the hook.  It's not quite as good as there other two songs, but still nice.  Unfortunately, even though the label says "Album Version," this is clearly a censored Radio Edit with reversed curses.  And this song features a lot of cursing, so it really sucks that this is the only way to hear it.

Unfortunately, this was the last One and One record; they never released a full-length, which is a big disappointment.  Interestingly, though, they did reunite in 2002 to contribute a couple of tracks to the rather odd-ball Legends of Hip-Hop compilation, released by Absolut vodka, which I reviewed this time last year.

I wonder if there's an unreleased One and One album in somebody's vaults, somewhere.  The fact that Next Plateau had them for over a year (one single in '96, another in '97) and the fact that they released a Clean Version without a Dirty Version both suggest that one probably was recorded, or was at least underway.  Something seriously needs to be done about all this great hip-hop music being locked away in vaults; it's downright criminal how much the people are missing out on!

One...

Doctor Ice has had a couple of cool careers in hip-hop: dancer for Whodini, member of UTFO, and successful solo artist signed to Jive (and later Ichiban).  But I don't think many people realize that he invented himself another time in the 90's and had another successful little hip-hop career during the "lyrical," underground, grimy  backpacker-type era.  Well, okay, maybe not successful as in huge record industry bucks.  But successful as in quality records that real heads ought to appreciate.

"Yo, kid.  let me tell you something about this business.  It's a fucked up business, you know what I'm saying?  I gotta teach you a whole lotta shit before you see what this shit is like.  It ain't nothing but some dirt, kid.  'Cause if your shit ain't phenomenal, you ain't in there.  So your shit must be phat."

That's the intro to "Phenomenon," the 1996 single by One and One on Next Plateau Records.  And One and One is Doctor Ice and his cousin, recording under the aliases Sunny Bumz and Harry Balz.  lol  I know, but try to get past the names.  See, you'd never know Doc Ice or anybody old school was remotely affiliated with this project if you didn't know going in - this is a pure 90's release, along the lines of like Black Maddness or Ill Bizkits.  It's all about rugged but clever wordplay spit over a slow boom-bap beat with seriously hard drums and under-stated samples.  Seriously, the beat's really tight.  In fact, DJ Premier later lifted it for his single "Equality" with Afu Ra; but One and One, who co-produced the track themselves with some guy(s) called Swing of Things, had it first, by about four years.   In fact, I'll go one step further and say it sounds better here.

So, Harry takes the first two verses: 

"Study long, study wrong,
You know lessons get learned in minutes.
Keep my diction - full of non-fiction,
I hate gimmicks,
executives' views on the rules
Of the game,
I'm using sense to make dollars
Real scholars bring change."

...And at first it seems like Doc's just gonna spit the hook in support of his younger cousin's street flow, but then he comes in with a sick final verse.  He comes so hard, again, you'd never thing it was an old school UTFO cat unless you recognized the voice. At the end, he even breaks into a little Brooklyn-style ragamuffin (which is actually something he's done on a few past projects).  Don't even think of it as a Doc Ice-related project, just another cool, completely overlooked "random rap" release.  Then, the fact that there's an old school legend on here is just like a little bonus.

This single just features the one mix of the one song, but it comes in the four requisite versions: Album, Radio, Instrumental and Acapella.  The one drawback is that the Acapella is actually of the Radio version, not the album version, so the curses are censored.  What's the point of that?

This is a really nice release, and like I said, it's pretty slept-on, so something you should be able to score pretty cheap.  Pretty cool, right?  But maybe now you're wondering if this is their only release, or if there's more.  Well...

Legends of Hip Hop

"LEGENDS OF HIP HOP describes a project that includes more than 35 hiphop legends from the first hour veterans to the recent stars. It includes names like Bambaataa, Melle Mel, Grandmaster Flash, Kurtis Blow, Ice-T... just to mention a few. The album was based on an idea to connect rap and hiphop greats from both the old and new skool[sic.] scene into one big project. The highlight of the album is the track 'The Fifth Element' which is performmed[sic.] by 34 hiphop legends."

That's the introduction to an album that I can't believe has somehow managed to be pretty much never written about. Legends of Hip Hop came out in 2002 on Absolut Records. Yes, like the vodka. A full-length album that features all original (well, almost... more on that later) material by such great big names in hip-hop that somehow managed to fly completely under the radar? How? Why?

Well, the album was put together by Kurtis Blow, in association with his Legends of Hip Hip old school tours. Blow co-produced all the music on this album with two guys named Informer and DJ Buck. They utilize a lot of live instrumentation, too... the liner notes credit musicians for guitars, trumpets, sax, a couple of violins and a viola. So, how is it? What exactly do we have here?

Ok, let's start with the "highlight of the album" (according to the liner notes quoted above... I actually disagree), the mega-posse cut "The Fifth Element." 34 hip-hop legends. That's pretty impressive, right? And the actual list will probably impress you more: Melle Mel, Ice-T, Flava Flav, Cheeks, Special K, Bambaataa, Run, Smooth Approach, Sha-Rock, Doc Ice, Busy Bee, Whodini, Raheem, Reggie Reg, Grandmaster Caz, DLB, LA Sunshine, Grand Puba, Pete DJ Jones, Kurtis Blow, Hollywood, Eddie Cheeba, Big Daddy Kane, Dano, Ceelo (as in Goodie Mob, yeah), Waterbed Kev, Speech, Kidd Creole, Grand Wizard Theodore, Dota Rock, Rakim & DJ Kool Herc. That's not a bunch of nobodies peppered with a few names, that's an incredible assembly of an all-star line-up!

...But, wait. The song's only four minutes long. And it's got a recurring hook, which takes up almost 50% of the song. And, half those guys are DJs, how do they rap on this track?

Well, if you guessed that everybody is given about 6-8 words to perform, you'd be right! But you didn't guess that, did you? Because that would be so ridiculously wack, you ruled it out before the thought could even fully form in your mind, right? But it's what they did. Excited to hear a Rakim feature you never heard before? Wanna read the lyrics? Well, here ya go:

"Ya owe it to yourself; get your education."

...That was it. That was the entirety of his contribution. And his was longer than a lot of the others!

So, yeah. They call it the "highlight of the album." They even include two mixes on here, the original and "Beathoavenz RMX," which liberally samples some Beethoven. I call it a big, fat "who cares?"

But the rest of the album is much more interesting. Most (plus a few other dudes) of the artists featured on that silly posse cut turn up again on this album to perform all new songs. Most are collaborations you've never seen happen before and are pretty interesting. Raheem, Grandmaster Caz and Shinehead provide a song called "Be 4," Ice-T, Chilli Mac and Rakim perform "Game of Life," Reggie Reg, Skeeta Ranks, Jalil, Ecstasy and Doc Ice do "Shake Them Hips," etc. Here we actually get to hear these artists get a chance to do something!

Just for the record, the other artists who turn up on this album are: Thug Nation, Kurupt, Harry Balz (don't know who that is? He's the other half of One and One, who we last heard from on Next Plateau Records in 1997!), The Ying Yang Twins, Steph Lova, T.O.P., GQ, and Lovebug Starski.

So, how are these songs? Well, they're varied... there's some nice lyrical performances, a variety of concepts and a good mix of styles. The production team of Blow, Informer and Buck I'm sure doesn't have you at the edge of your seat, but they're at least attempting something creatively different that's still got a traditional hip-hop vibe. It's not a great album, but guys like Ice-T, Melle, Sha-Rock, Kane, and others do drop some head-nodding verses. Flava Flav provides an amusingly bugged hook to "Old School Ball," with a faux British accent. The live instrumentation helps keep things interesting and some songs have nice cuts, too. It's a mixed bag, certainly; but a lot of this is really better than you jaded vets would expect.

To add to that mixed bag feeling, though, we have to address why Eminem and Royce da 5'9's names are on the cover. Well, "Nuttin To Do" by Bad Meets Evil is on here. Yes, the song from their '98 12" in Game Recordings. Why? I dunno. More interestingly, though, is "Bad Meets Evil - New Shrooms Mix." Yeah, Blow and team actually do their own, exclusive remix of the song from the Slim Shady LP. It's, uh... yeah, it's pretty corny.

But except for those two tracks and one other - this album also features Justine Simmons' dance tune "Praise My DJ's" featuring Run that originally dropped in 2000 - this is all new, original material, reminiscent of the noteworthy Raiders Of the Lost Art compilation released in 1994.

Now, in addition to this album, there are three related releases you should probably know about:

1) A 12" release of "The Fifth Element," which includes the original version and the Beathoavenz Remix version that's featured on this disc, as well as four more remixes (specifically: Sleepwalker Remix, Efe & Leeroy Remix, Nasty Remix and the Double Remix). Interesting, but I never picked this up, because frankly changing the beat wouldn't fix what's wrong with this song.

2) Another, completely unrelated hip-hop compilation called Legends of Hip Hop, which is just a generic collection of songs by 2 Live Crew, Ice-T and The World Class Wreckin' Crew on a label called Blue Dolphin. They're entirely unrelated save for the coincidentally matching title, so you can go ahead and disregard it... just be careful if you're ordering online that you know which one you're getting.

3) A 2-disc version that was released in Europe. Disc 1 is essentially the same as the US version, except it's missing the Bad Meets Evil remix, and instead features the Sleepwalker Remix of "Fifth Element" (from the 12" above). The second disc is then just another generic compilation of pre-existing hip-hop songs, this time basically a greatest hits of rap, featuring stuff like "Express Yourself" by NWA and "Summertime" by DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince. Personally, I'd stick with the single-disc US version, since it has the exclusive Bad Meets Evil remix, and if you really want the "Fifth Element," remix you could get the 12".

So, yeah. It's not a great album, but it has some worthwhile material. And with all the talent involved, it deserves at least to be talked about.