Review Summary: Finely cut crack just ready for the fiends!
After Wu-Tang’s eerie martial arts rap that made up their debut and Method Man’s and Old Dirty’s debuts, Raekwon’s obvious thought process was focused on progressing this sound to more majestic and theatrical forms. With
Only Built For Cuban Linx, Raekwon takes Wu-Tang’s sampling tendencies, and re-focuses them from old, dusty Kung Fu movies to 70s Mafioso films, and bases his entire persona and the record around this Mafia thinking. The sheer focus and visual effort put into the sound via RZA and Raekwon just might be the highlight of a classic record, with every part of
Only Built For Cuban Linx sounding smoothly and clean movement to its other parts. But alas,
Only Built For Cuban Linx is the second classic record put out by a collective that somehow is steamrolling and still managing to put out decent records even today, and sounds just as relevant, cool, terrifying, and real as it did before, and showed more potential from one of Wu-Tang’s future top members (Ghostface Killah).
Only Built For Cuban Linx despite its seemingly complex interiors, is a simple record substantially, and discusses Raekwon’s favorite topic; the drug trade. However, Raekwon, despite his purely one-dimensional vision of life, proves himself as the dart throwing master of visuals and imagery. As an MC, he is the pure emphasis of being in the role, his lyrics sort of set the scene of a powerful mafia don messing with the fiends and the cooking, his flow his aggressive, upbeat, and his voice is gruff and incredibly realistic. All of these tracks display Raekwon’s surrealism, whether it’s from a determined and gangster point of view (“Knuckleheadz”, “Wu Gambinos”), or from a stand point of emotions and logical thinking (“Heaven and Hell”, “Can It All Be So Simple (Remix)”), but certain tracks displace Raekwon’s pure imagery abilities and coke loving the most. “Knowledge God” is probably one of the albums best tracks in that sense, with his boasting, bombastic vocals booming through the speakers, his precise, eccentric technicality in his rhyme scheme (“Fly like cashmere, last year, my team caught bodies in Gravesmere/Hit a store owner named Mike Lavonia/Italiano, slanted-eyed bangin them fat Milano/Selling coke right out the bottle”), and Rae’s pure ability to ring off a couple of short details to create a full image make “Knowledge God” one of the albums easy highlights. The low-key “Spot Rusherz”, too, shows Rae’s lyricism, but does more to prove him as one of the better rappers to ever grab the mic, mixing punchlines and imagery into small punches (“Glasses gold, shinin like a real big boy/This nigga had mega ice on Chips Ahoy!”), and still manages to tell a story of an annoying mother***er messing with the great Raekwon, who deserving got shot in the hand (or better yet, “Shot his hand, he started screamin like a bitch!”).
Rae’s crack bagging sense isn’t all of
Only Built For Cuban Linx, a mistake Rae takes on throughout the rest of his discography (other than the obviously fantastic sequel.) Two other major contributors that make Rae’s debut album truly an experience instead of just another great Wu effort: RZA’s theatric 70s mafia soundtrack and Ghostface’s lyrics that sort of act as a second half of Rae’s Twoface version of Scareface that appears on
Only Built For Cuban Linx. The production of
Only Built for Cuban Linx is truly expert, and proves that RZA can do something other than the eerie dark atmospheres of the Wu’s debut. Whether it’s the on-the-edge violin Mafioso dramatic of “Wu-Gambinos”, the eerie soul samples of “Ice Water”, or mushy, weaving atmosphere of “Rainy Dayz”, RZA’s beats carry over this drab feeling of his past records occasional, but it’s on a much more major level, with his production sounding more like the soundtrack than a stash of minimalistic hip hop for martial artists, which is much more fitting for Raekwon’s mafia rap taken to a fantastical and majestic height.
It’s hard to point out a criticism about Rae’s debut album
Only Built For Cuban Linx, maybe it’s the fact that he isn’t the most hard rocking MC on either of the Wu’s big posse cuts “Guillotine” (Inspectah Deck, surprisingly enough) or “Wu Gambinos” (RZA, again, surprisingly) or the fact that some of the albums best tracks are low key, and in that sense, at first seem ignorable, or even the fact that Raekwon is a pretty one-dimensional MC. But these faults are punny and pathetic and should be thrown out as jokes and poor excuses for minor criticisms. If you want an album about crack,
Only Built For Cuban Linx is like crack: the movie. Wonderfully put-together, managed, and organized,
Only Built For Cuban Linx is a crack rap album that may even make your grandmother like rap! Hey anything is POSSIBLE!
