Bleep

Ice Cube opened the ‘90s following his acrimonious split from NWA with ‘AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted’, which became a considerable critical and commercial success, despite its challenging sound and lyrical content, a feat which makes Universal Music Series repress of the record a worthy listen. The release makes for a confrontational listen, with violent imagery scathingly delivered on topics relevant to Ice Cube’s political climate at the time, and which remain nonetheless pertinent issues today.

On ‘Endangered Species (Tales From the Darkside)’, the rapper focuses on racial tensions in his local area which were bubbling into violence, and reached a head a few years after the record’s release. With production from Public Enemy’s Bomb Squad crew, these incendiary lyrics are leant an extra sense of surreal terror, with radio headlines describing racial attacks rearing their sinister head and mangled strings laying the foundations for genres like Grime. On ‘The Nigga Ya Love To Hate’, the groove is part hip-hop, part techno, with an obsessive pound which drills home Ice Cube’s vocal delivery, even as the rapper’s haters scream chorus abuse at him. With the twisted funk of the album’s title track, scratched into an alien hip-hop cut, the record remains an example of the genre at its most confrontational and socially aware.