Epmd Business Never Personal

[Kayleen]

Theirony of the album's title is not lost on anybody familiar with EPMD's history,but for those of you new to Erick and Parrish Making Dollars, things could not havegotten MORE personal. Even though past efforts like "Strictly Business" and "Business as Usual" werehighly regarded hip-hop classics, that critical acclaim couldn't keep the group'sprivate business from going public in a very negative way. Parrish Smith's homewas robbed, Erick Sermon was named as a suspect, and when the tensions came to ahead Sermon implied (without outright saying) Smith had it coming anyway becausehe had been pocketing all of their album proceeds and shortchanging Sermon's share.The group split up in a very public and acrimonious way after "Business Never Personal"dropped, which made it all the more surprising when they reunited for a newalbum five years later.EPMD could never quite recapture the magic found on this CD after their reconciliation.There are some highlights and many lowlights to their post-1992 catalogue, but on"Business Never Personal" they were at the peak of their musical and lyrical prowess.The group's chemistry in the studio completely obscures whatever personal tensionsexisted behind the scenes, so in that respect at least they kept their businessPROFESSIONAL when it came to recording this album. The results of their effortswas the most successful single of EPMD's career and a personal favorite song of mine. You can't help but chuckle just a little at the fact that a song bemoaning rapperswho "Crossover" became their all-time biggest Billboard charting hit.Smith: "The rap era's outta control, brothers sellin their soul

to go gold, going, going, gone, another rapper sold

(To who?) To pop and R&B, not the MD

I'm strictly hip-hop, I'll stick to Kid Capri

Funk mode, yeah kid, that's how the Squad rolls

I know your head is bobbin, cause the neck knows

(Not like other rappers) frontin on they fans, they ill

Tryin to chill, sayin 'Damn it'd be great to sell a mill'

That's when the mind switch, to the pop tip

("Kid you're gonna be large!!")

Yeah right, that's what the company kicks

Forget the black crowds, you're wack now

In a zoot suit; frontin black, lookin mad foul

I speak for the hardcore (rough, rugged and raw)

I'm outta here, catch me chillin on my next tour

From the U.S. to the white cliffs of Dover

Strictly underground funk, keep the crossover"

I think the problem with EPMD is that they weren\u2019t a distinct voice, or even made up of distinct voices (as in, I have trouble telling the two apart). Even in the microcosm of 1988, the year their debut dropped, they had to contend with Big Daddy Kane and Eric B. & Rakim defining and then perfecting speed and flow on Long Live the Kane and Follow the Leader, N.W.A.\u2019s Straight Outta Compton, Public Enemy\u2019s It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back and Slick Rick\u2019s The Great Adventures Of Slick Rick. (Lot of classics\u2026 and then that Slick Rick album.)

As rappers, Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith aren\u2019t comparable to Kane or Rakim on the microphone, nor do they exude a \u2018force of nature\u2019 akin to Ice Cube or Chuck D. And they embarrass themselves when they try to tell a story in a verse. Moreover, as the years went on, both were prone to corny one-liners: \u201CNo missions impossible ask Tom Cruise,\u201D \u201CI transform like Spawn,\u201D \u201CI take action, like film crews.\u201D (Typically speaking, if Erick Sermon is setting up a simile, you bet your ass it\u2019s gonna land with a thud.) So in the void of anything particularly commanding about either of them, they just rode the groove with a slow flow and were hip-hop\u2019s friendlist group until they were outclassed by De La Soul and they stopped being so friendly.

Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith were both born in 1968, which makes them 19 at the time they were making Strictly Business, and despite their youth and despite a lack of technical know-how (at the time of making debut single \u201CIt\u2019s My Thing,\u201D Sermon admitted in an interview that he had no idea what a sampler or a producer was; \u201C[w]e didn't know what a producer was. We thought everyone on the radio made their own records. We thought every record you heard on the radio was made by that artist\u201D), they learned quick and made an incredible-sounding and fresh record. I also respect that Sermon made a point not to rely on the usual time-tested funk/soul samples (\u201CWhile the world was sampling James Brown, we was over here venturing out on something that was other. We sampled some other type of shit\u201D), even if that only basically amounts to one Eric Clapton sample on this record, it still yielded them a great hook even if they had to paid for it later. Still, the Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin samples go a long way.

The album is front-loaded, sure, although hip-hop historians will like the fact that DJ Premier took the drums off \u201CYou\u2019re a Customer\u201D for \u201CMass Appeal\u201D and MF DOOM nabbed a single line from the deadly-dull closer \u201CJane\u201D for \u201CHoe Cakes\u201D (\u201CJane\u201D even has a skit about how the record was about to end but then they wanted to make a song about some ex which ended up being a thread throughout each of their albums moving forward). That said, \u201CThe Steve Martin\u201D is the best song on the second side and not to be missed, a hooky little thing thanks to the indelible Otis Redding horn sample. As for the other two songs there, \u201CGet Off the Bandwagon\u201D is the only song here which has \u2018aged poorly\u2019 thanks to its electro beat that probably didn\u2019t even sound good in 1988, and then \u201CD.J. K La Boss\u201D lets the scratcher with the same name go at it for 4 minutes (enthralling for the first few times you hear it).

Unfinished Business (1989) is a sophomore slump, which I attribute to the fact that there seems to be less fire beneath their feet now that they\u2019ve made it. Hey, it happens to rappers. And while they got a surprisingly large amount of mileage for the business puns in their album titles (this album, Business as Usual and Back in Business being their best titles for the context they came in), they perhaps also inadvertently revealed an unwillingness to break away from what became a formula.

As mentioned, 1989 saw breakthroughs in sampling elsewhere in the east coast but EPMD are content to churn out another Strictly Business. Okay, yes, there is something new in \u201CYou Had Too Much to Drink,\u201D but that\u2019s also the worst track on the album, a weird mix of house keyboard chords and rap-rock blistering guitar but with a Good Message (don\u2019t drink and drive). Elsewhere, Smith continues his AIDS streak (weird line, I know) on \u201CWho\u2019s Booty\u201D: \u201CI had to cover my nose, not to ruin the mood / Because I knew I wasn't fishing but I smelled seafood / Smelled like shrimp or lobster, or tuna of the sea / And it wasn't worth catching the A to I to D to the S oh yes / The S is for safe sex,\u201D which is just unfortunate all around. (Shame because the parts that lead up to it about how he\u2019s the microphone doctor are funny.) The only truly great song of the bunch is \u201CPlease Listen To My Demo\u201D with its eerie sample and humbling storytelling (as opposed to storytelling about women), and they get a point for sampling David Bowie for the closer.

Sermon\u2019s beats on Business as Usual (1990) are denser; there\u2019s more to sink your teeth into, but it also marks the beginning of EPMD\u2019s far less interesting turn towards being \u2018hard\u2019 above all else; the titles of the opening salvo go like this: \u201CI\u2019m Mad,\u201D \u201CHardcore,\u201D \u201CRampage,\u201D \u201CManslaughter,\u201D and all this culminates in the fifth song, where they beat and rape a trans person for the simple fact that they were a trans person. EPMD will have a lot of bad songs moving forward, but it\u2019s hard to think of any that are as morally repulsive as \u201CJane 3.\u201D Hard to think of any song as morally repulsive. (Worth noting is that they also compare themselves to Bruce Jenner while doing all this.) In this context, do I feel sorry that RZA took the sample for \u201CBrother not a Jock\u201D and turned it into a better beat for \u201CDaytona 500?\u201D Fuck no.

Business Never Personal (1992) contains their biggest hit in \u201CCrossover,\u201D which reached #42 on the Billboard Hot 100, an ironic achievement since the song admonishes rappers crossing over while at the same time being the catchiest song they ever penned thanks to the Roger Troutman sample. \u201CI stick to underground, keep the crossover,\u201D they say, hence why they never bothered making a song like crossover again: i.e. a song with lyrics about something specific bolstered by a melodious sample. It\u2019s ultimately off the back of a few dope cuts that allows Business Never Personal to be their second-best album: in addition to \u201CCrossover,\u201D there\u2019s \u201CCan't Hear Nothing But The Music,\u201D which plays like a denser \u201CMicrophone Fiend\u201D with yet another bright sample (Barbara Mason going \u2018Ooh, baby\u2019) and then \u201CHeadbanger\u201D which Sermon made for Ice Cube in mind and you can tell: it\u2019s a lot heavier than EPMD would typically rap over.

Business Never Personal suggested that the end was near with the fact that Jane died in the final song. Had this been EPMD\u2019s discography, it would have been a solid 4-album run but would have still paled in comparison to the 4-album run of contemporary Eric B. & Rakim, whose discography are alphabetically right after EPMD for hip-hop in my Itunes library. Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith never grew up, never even feigned to want to age, which is emblematic of a lot of rappers, sure and partially why so many hip-hop artists struggle to make records in their late careers. By contrast, Rakim actually did grow up: Don\u2019t Sweat the Technique is a surprisingly mature and even graceful record even if it has a few weak beats (it\u2019s a great and underrated record and better than any EPMD record post-Strictly Business).

3a8082e126