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As the album struck gold domestically and shipped over 1 million copies worldwide, Laugh Now, Cry Later will have a special place in Cube’s discography for this reason, but in the long run? It’ll be seen as a disappointing effort that sold well. What makes this album stick out is the fact that it was his first independent album, allowing Cube to have creative control and see bigger profits off the success of the album. My biggest issue with this album is the inconsistent production, as I was never the biggest fan of Cube over generic Lil Jon or Scott Storch beats, but here we are. He created some dope songs like “Growin Up”, “The N**** Trap”, and a few others, but there’s also a few songs that completely fall short of expectations and hopes. Production isn’t cohesive, but Cube manages to put together a solid effort from a lyrical standpoint. However, quality wise, I must admit… this album lacks a lot. "Thank God the gangsta's back," goes a hook, "we ain't gotta put up with this brainless rap." True stories.A lot of people see this as the comeback album and of course this album brought Cube back to music relevance. Beats to bang out to, beats to fuck to, beats to eat a fuckin' corn on the cob to, beats to burn down cities to. This record contains everything I love about hip-hop. Then comes three minutes of perfect, jubilant, mightily, thick revolutionary party music. Cos if they didn't create these kid of conditions I wouldn't have shit to rap about." I'm blaming them motherfuckers for gangsta rap. It's our fault motheruckers is starvin' in Africa. It's our fault motherfuckers is dying in Iraq. The album's first single, the Maestro produced banger 'Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It' and 'Thank God' both step to the defence of Cube's demonised art-form - "I can act like a animal / ain't nothing to it, gangsta rap made me do it," he spits sarcastically on the former, elaborating further on the latter: "They wanna blame the world's problems on gangsta rap. "It takes a nation of niggers to hold us back / it takes a nation of niggers and streets of crack." "You scared of the government, they scared of me," he declares. "A lunatic, ya''l know what I represent - The only rapper wanna fist fight the president," he spits, gladiatorally on the PE-update 'It Takes A Nation', demanding his people ignore brainwashing elitist white propaganda and rise up.
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Shit sounds fresh throughout.Īnd lyrically, as I said, Cube cuts harder than ever. Ice walks the line between coasts like an ambassador, whether it's the southern, synth lead machine-gun-tom doom vibes of songs like the Jeezy-assisted opener 'I Got My Locks On' and the arpeggioed-up synth horn stomper 'Jack In The Box', or the West-Coast-classicallity of joints like the incendiary 'It Takes A Nation', the breezy 'Hood Mentality' or the brooding 'Get Money, Spend Money, No Money'.
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The celebrated, furious, sample-heavy Bomb Squad production of his earlier work is gone, replaced with a thoroughly contemporary, but resolutely gangsta and deliciously musical beats. And his message has been diluted not one iota. Taking a tar brush to whitewashed Hollywood, whether it be sneakily illuminating hood comedy like the Friday series, or even kiddie flicks like Daddy Day Care, Cube took his independent hustle global, and put black faces on the screen, behind the cameras, and in the boardrooms. but Ice Cube has remained a revolutionary. Some say Cube's recorded output has suffered due to his 1990s move to movies, that he sold out. His '91 classic 'Death Certificate' opened my then 11-year-old eyes to a side of America that conventional history and news reports had been trying to hide since Lincoln "freed" the slaves. Menacing, direct, eloquent as Shakespeare. Easy E was the streets, Dre was the beats, and Cube was the brain, the raw, uncut intelligence. NWA were truly political, laying bare the segregation and genocide going on in Reagan's supposed pinnacle of civilisation like a wound. Both men wield their worlds like swords, both men terrify wankers. Lil Wayne would have been the populist choice. 21 years deep into the game, 20 since his group NWA scared the living shit out of America, Cube chooses a man initially dismissed as just another coke rapper, now widely regarded as the most important hood-commentator of his generation to make the link between then and now. That it's Southern trap-star Young Jeezy is even more so. That the first rapper you hear on this, Ice Cube's ninth LP isn't Ice Cube is telling.