Their early stuff was so good. Definitely the quitessential Japanese heavy metal band.

Yeah, it's solid album, maybe just a tad overlong (for hip hop, less is sometimes more, in my opinion). He just kinda disappeared for a while after that album though, and then has had, what, like one album in the last 20 years? I know that he's not exactly on the cutting edge (even at the time of The 18th Letter his style was dated - not that I'm complaining), but hasn't ever really done anything truly awful, and you figure that there would be somewhere on the legacy circuit for him to slot into. I guess it's a bit tough if you are simply an MC and not involved in the production side of things.

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Dated? How? He was rhyming differently in 97 than he was in 92. That was part of the problem. He switched his flow up, and a lot of fans didn't like it. I would not say songs like The 18th Letter and The Mystery of God were 'dated' in 1997. The way he stacks phrases and subtly modulates his flow roughly fits into the time period. Sure he wasn't 'cutting edge', more of an elder statesman, but dated is not a word I would use for that album. I wish he released it a year earlier though. He sat on it for too long. However, it probably sounds better now than it did then.

Big Daddy Kane was dated in 97, not Rakim, although BDK's album in 98 is kind of underrated. Rakim disappeared partially because he got fed up with the industry, especially after the Aftermath period didn't work out. The Master was quite good, if patchy, but The Seventh Seal was ordinary. He hasn't released new material in 11 years.


N.P Candlemass Nightfall.

It's been a long time since I've listened to it, but I remember it sounding more like a typical '94 East coast boom bap album with Rakim's usual themes of lyrical prowess or 5% teachings, when in '98 everyone was Mafiosi or shiny suits. You are probably right about his flow, I'm thinking just more in terms of the aesthetics being dated (although I recollect they may have had the odd R&B chorus here), even with him trying to update and bringing in Primo and Pete Rock. I don't have an issue with it as it's right in my wheelhouse, just felt like him trying to modernise and even then he was a couple of years behind. That tended to be the reaction I got whenever I showed friends at the time as well.

Some of it does sound like, but other tracks do not.

The shiny suit era didn't really take off until a year later from memory.



Your friends must have been real 'trendy' types then, because even a friend of mine who is in the rap scene (i.e. raps and produces) and tends to gravitate towards stuff that's new loved the singles from that album in 97. There is no way this sounds like typical 94 NY boom bap:






^^Guess Who's Back is boom bap, but it is not 94 style, especially not with that sample. While this one sounds like post-Wu:




Either way, yeah, it wasn't a rap album aimed at teenagers, so perhaps it's obvious why it didn't appeal to them, and at that time, even though Rakim was only 29/30, he may as well have been 50.

Nice. I see Nowhere turned 30 the other day, more and more of these anniversaries these days, really makes me feel old.

You can tell Masvidal and Reinert really had an impact on the band's sound. 4/5 album - definitely Death's best.

Cause we are old bro

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What about Sekima II? First time karaoke in Japan.

^ Will have to revisit that band.

NP:

Best album title ever!

I guess they are more hard rock than metal but they are listed on Encyclopedia Metallum. They were the first Japanese band I heard after Loudness. Listening to new BOC & Mork Grynning.

Speaking of Jap metal...

NP:

Yeah man, listening back you are right (also, not going to lie, my friends who were into rap were definitely trendy I think that tends to be the nature of the genre, it's always seemed willing to move on, just part of the competitive nature, even though I know there are obviously a lot of people who like the older stuff, like myself, and just bitch about newer stuff and how it's not the same /only half jk).

My memory of it is obviously very poor It's probably more just the subject matter that made me feel that way, and Rakim placing himself as an elder-statemen of sorts (which he kinda was at that point, and deservedly so). I think I just tend to reach for Follow The Leader or Let The Rhythm Hit 'Em when I want some Rakim.

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Great Japanese heavy metal - almost feels like a Japanese successor to Riot's Fire Down Under.

Cool cover artwork

Early Japanese power metal.