Outlawz The Outlawz - One Nation (Album)
- Thread starter Rukas
- Start date
Personally I lost interest in the Outlawz. They went in this strange direction with their music where I find literally all of their songs I recall hearing over the last 10 years or so to be boring. They sound like there's zero energy or passion behind them. The features look nice on paper, but every song makes me want to skip it within 5 seconds. And that's exactly what I did with this album as well.
Also, at this point all of the former Outlawz who "had it" in my book are either dead or retired. Noble and Edi are carrying the legacy, which is nice, but I can't pretend to like their music.
Also, at this point all of the former Outlawz who "had it" in my book are either dead or retired. Noble and Edi are carrying the legacy, which is nice, but I can't pretend to like their music.
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I've been thinking about this. I remember it being a thing that people would jokingly say on forums, stuff like "it's one of the few Outlawz verses I never skip". So I always lived under the impression that skipping Lawz verses was a common thing. Pac was very caught up in a moralistic way of thinking, so much so that his art suffered from it. He probably knew, realized, and wouldn't have it any other way, but his insistance on lifting everyone around him actually held his art back I do belieeve. It also garnered him him a lot of his reputation as a folk hero, though, so say what you will of it. But in my estimation, featuring the Outlawz on so much of his music was to the detriment of some of it. It did however fuel the false notion that they belonged there.
So when I listen to their music, I feel the same way as you, but I even took it a step further and thought "okay, so it feels like theyre passion missing from their music, but is there really?" so I tried to "objectively" assess whether that's actually the case. So if you decide on some ways to determine passion in their voice, and then just listen to their songs, it's like... They're rapping. They're not mumbling. They're maybe not screaming like Pac would some times do, but a lot of rappers that I'd never think of as "dispassionate" also never scream their lyrics, so that's not what passion is. For all intents and purposes, they speak their lyrics as if they mean them. I don't think it's their passion or career choices that make their music boring. I just don't think they're very compelling artists. I don't think they ever were. They maybe had a cool verse here or a cool line there, but you keep spewing em out like Pac and the Outlawz did, and something's bound to stick. Pac was the only truly special among them. Fatal and Yak had a lot of potential, but they were Pac's same age and still hadn't risen much higher than beign most people's favorite 2Pac side kicks. They might have had shots at lesser solo careers than Pac, that would still put them on their own trajectory, but I doubt they would ever make it on any top 10 rappers lists, ever. Not with Pac's help and not without it. I take that all as meaning that the universe and reality is telling us they weren't superstar material. I mean, if you do some statistics on how many people there are in the world, and how many become super stars, the idea that seven dudes from the same family/neighbourhood were all gonna make it seems unrealistic. They were only in the position they were in after his death because of his compulsion to lift everybody. He was playing God lol.
And I'm not saying that's a bad thing in the end, just that it's an explanation for why most Outlawz music is boring to listen to. I'll give it to them, the Retribution album actually sounds really good. But they didn't invent that. It's just a really good emulation of a 2Pac/Death Row album. It's good because it feels like it could have featured a Pac verse on every song and been a 2Pac + Outlawz album. So in essence, it's good because it sounds like a 2Pac album, not because the Outlawz pioneered and made great art. It's not "their" sound. Who knows, maybe Pac even picked some of the beats and helped write some of the verses for it. Some of the songs were maybe even recorded before he died.
So when I listen to their music, I feel the same way as you, but I even took it a step further and thought "okay, so it feels like theyre passion missing from their music, but is there really?" so I tried to "objectively" assess whether that's actually the case. So if you decide on some ways to determine passion in their voice, and then just listen to their songs, it's like... They're rapping. They're not mumbling. They're maybe not screaming like Pac would some times do, but a lot of rappers that I'd never think of as "dispassionate" also never scream their lyrics, so that's not what passion is. For all intents and purposes, they speak their lyrics as if they mean them. I don't think it's their passion or career choices that make their music boring. I just don't think they're very compelling artists. I don't think they ever were. They maybe had a cool verse here or a cool line there, but you keep spewing em out like Pac and the Outlawz did, and something's bound to stick. Pac was the only truly special among them. Fatal and Yak had a lot of potential, but they were Pac's same age and still hadn't risen much higher than beign most people's favorite 2Pac side kicks. They might have had shots at lesser solo careers than Pac, that would still put them on their own trajectory, but I doubt they would ever make it on any top 10 rappers lists, ever. Not with Pac's help and not without it. I take that all as meaning that the universe and reality is telling us they weren't superstar material. I mean, if you do some statistics on how many people there are in the world, and how many become super stars, the idea that seven dudes from the same family/neighbourhood were all gonna make it seems unrealistic. They were only in the position they were in after his death because of his compulsion to lift everybody. He was playing God lol.
And I'm not saying that's a bad thing in the end, just that it's an explanation for why most Outlawz music is boring to listen to. I'll give it to them, the Retribution album actually sounds really good. But they didn't invent that. It's just a really good emulation of a 2Pac/Death Row album. It's good because it feels like it could have featured a Pac verse on every song and been a 2Pac + Outlawz album. So in essence, it's good because it sounds like a 2Pac album, not because the Outlawz pioneered and made great art. It's not "their" sound. Who knows, maybe Pac even picked some of the beats and helped write some of the verses for it. Some of the songs were maybe even recorded before he died.
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I think you've hit a nail on the head there, or a lot of them really.
I also suspect the Outlawz that rapped with 2pac in 1996 were a temporary squad, and they're recognized as his "crew" 25 years later simply because he died when Edi, Kastro, Noble etc were in that group, making them 2pac's "last" crew. But 2pac was known to switch who he rapped with or even his artistic style a LOT during his short career. Makaveli sounded completely different than AEOM, which was also a huge departure from MATW. And all of these were released in 95/96. Which makes me wonder how much his music would've changed over the years, but I digress.
Point is, people he featured on his songs in 1996 were completely different than those that he rapped with in 1994, for instance. It's likely the Outlawz as we know them would have been abandoned, span-off as an independent, short-lived project and left alone by 2pac who would've picked up new proteges to "lift up" instead. Perhaps they were already on their last leg. It's more likely than not that Edi and Noble would have seen a similar fate as Mouse Man or Macadoshis from 2pac's earlier projects - relegated to irrelevance with no leg to stand on on their own the moment 2pac picked his next projects.
That said, one thing has to be said - while Edi and Noble are far from great artists, they are capable of delivering at least halfway decent music. At 100% they can step up to the kind of music they delivered on Hail Mary, Retribution, or even later on songs like "Real Talk" which are actually quite decent. I think the biggest problem most of the time is that they're not doing their best with what they have, delivering music quality that's way below that.
Case in point - Fatal. There's an enormous difference between Fatal on Hit em Up, Made N****z, more recently "Rain on me" or "Dumpin", where he really shines and makes you believe he's had enough talent on his own to make it as a successful artist, and the Fatal we heard on most of his own albums which largely disappointed and felt honestly low-effort in comparison. "Dumpin" was recorded more than a decade after 2pac died and Fatal there is just on a different plane of existence, dropping probably the best verse of that entire 2pac album. It's like there are two different rappers - one who steps up to a solid commercial success potential, and one who thinks he's just a mixtape-peddler.
For Edi and Noble, even at their 110% they are rather underwhelming, but this is compounded by the fact that most of the time these days I feel like they are delivering maybe 10% of what even they are capable of. I don't know how to define this, but I can't shake this feeling that they're not even trying to make a good song anymore. I watch their live performances and they're just.. standing there, bobbing their heads, making some forced hand gestures as they recite their lyrics looking rather uninterested in what they're doing. It's like instead of being hungry go-getters they act like it's their 9-5 and they're just waiting to clock out.
I also suspect the Outlawz that rapped with 2pac in 1996 were a temporary squad, and they're recognized as his "crew" 25 years later simply because he died when Edi, Kastro, Noble etc were in that group, making them 2pac's "last" crew. But 2pac was known to switch who he rapped with or even his artistic style a LOT during his short career. Makaveli sounded completely different than AEOM, which was also a huge departure from MATW. And all of these were released in 95/96. Which makes me wonder how much his music would've changed over the years, but I digress.
Point is, people he featured on his songs in 1996 were completely different than those that he rapped with in 1994, for instance. It's likely the Outlawz as we know them would have been abandoned, span-off as an independent, short-lived project and left alone by 2pac who would've picked up new proteges to "lift up" instead. Perhaps they were already on their last leg. It's more likely than not that Edi and Noble would have seen a similar fate as Mouse Man or Macadoshis from 2pac's earlier projects - relegated to irrelevance with no leg to stand on on their own the moment 2pac picked his next projects.
That said, one thing has to be said - while Edi and Noble are far from great artists, they are capable of delivering at least halfway decent music. At 100% they can step up to the kind of music they delivered on Hail Mary, Retribution, or even later on songs like "Real Talk" which are actually quite decent. I think the biggest problem most of the time is that they're not doing their best with what they have, delivering music quality that's way below that.
Case in point - Fatal. There's an enormous difference between Fatal on Hit em Up, Made N****z, more recently "Rain on me" or "Dumpin", where he really shines and makes you believe he's had enough talent on his own to make it as a successful artist, and the Fatal we heard on most of his own albums which largely disappointed and felt honestly low-effort in comparison. "Dumpin" was recorded more than a decade after 2pac died and Fatal there is just on a different plane of existence, dropping probably the best verse of that entire 2pac album. It's like there are two different rappers - one who steps up to a solid commercial success potential, and one who thinks he's just a mixtape-peddler.
For Edi and Noble, even at their 110% they are rather underwhelming, but this is compounded by the fact that most of the time these days I feel like they are delivering maybe 10% of what even they are capable of. I don't know how to define this, but I can't shake this feeling that they're not even trying to make a good song anymore. I watch their live performances and they're just.. standing there, bobbing their heads, making some forced hand gestures as they recite their lyrics looking rather uninterested in what they're doing. It's like instead of being hungry go-getters they act like it's their 9-5 and they're just waiting to clock out.
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That's a really good point about temporary squads. I don't think they would be ditched like Thug Life kinda was, though. I mean, I guess they contributed to their own downfall by doing street shit that landed at least Rated R in jail. I'm guessing there are reasons why Pac thought "fuck em, they're a liability" and moved on. I don't think he would do the same with the Outlawz and just move on from them. If nothing else, wasn't Kadafi's mother like his secretary or something? Like, she'd run some of his business shit for him. I just know she was involved behind the scenes somehow. But I do think he was setting them up to stand on their own, and that eventually they would stop featuring on all his music, instead releasing their own albums with one to two features by him. I could picture him thinking Kadafi was gonna be like the lieutenant, the leader of the Outlawz in his absence. He was gonna set up Makaveli Records, teach them to do the shit on their own, and only have to contribute a couple of verses per project, as well as maybe calling them in for a song or two on his own albums. Just like Eminem and 50 did with G-Unit. Then I think he would move on to making another group with new people. Like, I actually think Pac thought of this as a model of business where he'd bring up people from the streets, turn them into rappers, put them on his label, teach them to make money, and just keep going like that to help create more young black entrepreneurs. I am almost certain that was his vision.
States don't even know how to deal with that problem though. You give money to people that don't know how to spend it, they'll just splurge it on drugs and bullshit. So he almost certainly would have gotten into tons of drama over people he lifted up eventually just destroying their little empire that he gave them. I think if Pac had stayed alive for another decade, he'd learn to see a new side of people. That some people can't be helped. And that some people he surrounded himself with weren't really good people at the core. And that some were. Alas, this is my digression
I always loved EDI's verse on Don't Go 2 Sleep.
States don't even know how to deal with that problem though. You give money to people that don't know how to spend it, they'll just splurge it on drugs and bullshit. So he almost certainly would have gotten into tons of drama over people he lifted up eventually just destroying their little empire that he gave them. I think if Pac had stayed alive for another decade, he'd learn to see a new side of people. That some people can't be helped. And that some people he surrounded himself with weren't really good people at the core. And that some were. Alas, this is my digression
I always loved EDI's verse on Don't Go 2 Sleep.
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I did some digging and found a recent interview with Fatal's people who were with 2pac throughout the entire DeathRow East thing days before Pac died. This is a very interesting interview as it's probably the most detailed description of what happened during the Nas incident, for instance. But check what they said Tupac's intention was for the Outlawz:
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