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album<br />
reviews<br />
09.05<br />
Guru<br />
Version 7.0: The Street<br />
Scriptures<br />
7 Grand/US/CD<br />
O.c.<br />
Two pillars of ’90s<br />
hip-hop resurface<br />
with mixed results.<br />
O.C.<br />
Starchild<br />
Grit/US/CD<br />
True school-minded MCs looking to replicate and evoke the<br />
essence of the classics have found a simple solution: do as<br />
was done back in those days and record uniform-sounding<br />
albums with a single, focused producer. North Carolina<br />
beatmaker 9th Wonder has become a go-to guy for these<br />
sort of releases, hooking up beats for entire albums by Murs<br />
of the Living Legends, Jean Grae, and Buckshot. Similarly,<br />
EDO.G and Pete Rock collaborated thoroughly for 2004 My<br />
Own Worst Enemy, while Common and Kanye West conceived<br />
Common’s Be together.<br />
One person who has always known the value of steady<br />
vibing with your beatmaker in the studio is the emcee Mr.<br />
Keith Elam, known to fans as Gifted Unlimited Rhymes<br />
Universal–Guru. With DJ Premier in his corner, Guru’s been<br />
one-half of Gang Starr, arguably hip-hop’s most consistent<br />
album-making legacy. Without Premier’s cutting analog<br />
beats or the warm organic instrumentation of his Jazzmatazz<br />
records, Guru’s monotone delivery tends to suffer, as evidenced<br />
on 2001’s Baldhead Slick & Da Click LP.<br />
For his first proper solo album under the name Guru, he’s<br />
enlisted the hand of Solar, a Brooklyn-bred producer who also<br />
happens to be his partner in the pair’s new 7 Grand label.<br />
Version 7.0 is a rocky start to the relationship though, as<br />
Solar’s beats sound hollow and somewhat careless, lacking<br />
any semblance of the bite and bounce we’re used to hearing<br />
Guru over. While the usual tales of hard knocks (“Surviving<br />
Tha Game,” “Feed the Hungry”) and self-promotional tomes<br />
(“Don Status,” “Hall of Fame”) might be good enough over<br />
classic Premo beats, they don’t cut the mustard here.<br />
O.C.’s Starchild, on the other hand, is a return-to-form for<br />
the veteran Brooklyn-Queens MC, who followed his classic<br />
mid-‘90s LPs Word...Life and Jewelz with 2001’s forgettable<br />
Bon Appetit, then fell off the map for four years. With beats<br />
from largely unknown producers the Locsmif, Vanguard, and<br />
Soul Supreme laying the foundation for a 13-song wall of<br />
focused rhymes, Starchild has all the makings of a sleeper<br />
classic.<br />
The only thing is, it will never see a U.S. release in its<br />
original form. After launching the album in Europe and Japan,<br />
Boston-based Grit Records has scrapped this version of the<br />
album due to sample clearance issues and the impending<br />
release of another O.C. LP on Hiero Imperium. Word has it<br />
that when Starchild eventually does hit US streets it will be<br />
produced entirely by Pete Rock; while that collaboration will<br />
no doubt have beat-minded heads salivating at the mouth, it’s<br />
an album that, as it stands, doesn’t need improving.<br />
Songs like “Everidae” and “Who Run It” seamlessly flow<br />
into one another like one continuous thought. With the only<br />
guest appearance coming in the form of a sung hook from<br />
O.C.’s boyhood neighbor, Pharoahe Monch, the conversations<br />
are instead between O.C. and the music. The result is uncalculated,<br />
familiar yet original, and one of the better straight-up<br />
rap albums of 2005. Jesse Serwer<br />
79
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