Non-Sports Post of the Week - Hip Hop Tribute: Anthony cruZ, The Most Underrated

Since its kind of a slow news day in the sports world, and I couldn't care less about the NFL draft, I figured I would take this time to pivot towards music and educate any casual hip-hop fans out there about an underrated legend.  AZ, born Anthony Cruz in 1972 in Brooklyn, NY, is a rhetorical genius and a masterful MC.  If I were to say the same about Nas, most would respond; 'duh'.  But I have found an alarming number of kids in my age group, who generally knows what's up with rap music, do not know what's up with AZ.  That is tragic, in my opinion.

Without going into too much detailed history, AZ came up with Nas, they were comrades since they were teenagers and grew up in the golden age of hip hop music; the late '80s - early '90s in New York City.  During which they simultaneously experienced a time and place that cultivated a new genre of music to its best form, while realizing U.S. society in its worst form displayed in front of them.  I refer to the extreme poverty, with the infusion of a brand new drug form called 'crack cocaine,' which led to incredible levels of violence, despair, and urban decline in New York City during the early 1990s.

Those of you whom are familiar with Nas and not AZ, he is the only featured MC on Nas' perfect debut album Illmatic, released in 1994 when Nas was 20 years old.  On the first track, "Life's a Bitch," AZ drops one of the most legendary hip-hop verses.

"Visualizin' the realism of life and actuality, fuck who's the baddest, a person's status depends on salary,
And my mentality is; money-orientated, I'm destined to live the dream for all my peeps who never made it."

One year after Nas' debut was released, AZ first LP "Doe or Die" was dropped, and what prompted me to make this post was listening through this album for the thousandth time and being in awe of its brilliance.  I will post several of the best tracks, since my purpose for this post is to spread the music to those who may not be aware of it.

"Rather Unique"

"Doe or Die"

"Gimmie Your's" ft. Nas

 

 "Mo' Money, Mo' Murder, Mo' Homicide" ft. Nas

The music speaks for itself, and let me just say since my audience is at least partially my English class, if you are an English major you should like rap, and if you like rap you gotta love this dude and appreciate his lyrical prowess; how the way he delivers the English language is a special thing to behold, even if you can't decipher all the slang, or don't care for the provocative subject matter.  To consider his rap moniker alone; the first and last letter of his name, which are also the first and last letter of the alphabet, is telling about the nature of his craft.  AZ claims to have read more than 5,000 books in his lifetime, yet he was most certainly a high-school dropout.  I would point out that, rap can be literary in the same way a novel or movie can be.  If some are turned off by the title of that last track, I would urge you to consider this, and listen to it like you would watch a classic gangster flick, because that is the style of that particular track.  Other tracks are far more personal and auto-biographical, but as with most things, context is everything.

I worry about the younger generation, regarding their relationship to hip-hop music and culture.  I believe it has gotten away from its essence, and most these young kids don't really know shit about it.  Classic albums from the '90s are just what the doctor ordered, AZ in particular.  That concludes' my tribute/rant, I will leave you with one more track from a much newer album, with a very artistically ghetto visual style for the video.  AZ is still doing his thing, go out and buy his next album I believe it will be a sequel to his classic debut, entitled "Doe or Die 2." Also, if there is a whole department at UVM for film/television studies, there should at least be one English class taught on hip-hop.  I'm out.