CLIPSE: THE KEVIN COSTNER'S OF CRACK RAP
A new album is throwback to the days of tight rhymes about selling drugs
The Clipse, a Virginia born duo who made mark in the early ‘00s with “Grindin’” and other choice joints, have returned with an album, ‘Let God Sort It Out,’ that has made old heads happy judging by social media chatter. After recording a few albums and mix tapes Pusha T (aka Terrence Thorton) and his brother Malice (Gene Thorton) went on hiatus as a group, though both remained a presence in hip hop culture. Pusha was once part of G.O.O.D. Music, Ye’s (aka Kanye West), contributing to Ye’s landmark 2010 album, ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy,’ and released four solo albums. Moreover his outspoken nature made him podcast staple. Pusha T is now estranged from his erratic old benefactor Ye and dismissive of many younger MCs, particularly Travis Scott. Malice published a memoir Pitiful, Poor, Blind & Naked, about his fear of contracting HIV, his conversion to Christianity and the adoption of the professional handle, No Malice, made a documentary (The End of Malice) and released a couple of solo albums.
Having reconciled whatever personal and philosophical issues they had the two brothers have reunited with album produced by fellow Virginian, Pharrell Williams. ‘Let God Sort It Out’ is the latest addition to an era of hip hop when middle aged rappers (Pusha T is 48, No Malice is 52) have returned to the studio after staying on the sidelines for extended periods.
The Clipse began their career in 1994, when crack was the dominant street drug and the brother’s dealt in their hometown of Virginia Beach. “Crack rap” was once the engine behind scores of MCs and their rhymes, from NWA to Notorious BIG to Jay-Z. These narratives put the glamour, criminality and trauma of the drug trade at their center, while also narrow casting the thematic range of their genre.
In a sense these crack rap narratives were Westerns with the MCs outlaws, rustling crack rocks in opposition to police, the DEA and rivals gangs. If B.I.G. was the John Wayne of this style and Jay-Z the Clint Eastwood, the Clipse are Kevin Costner circa ‘Dances with Wolves.’ It’s the best review I could give of ‘Let God Sort It Out.’ These days crack has taken a back seat as America’s top street drug to fentanyl, meth and ketamine, just as the kind of tightly syncopated rhymes of the ‘90s and ‘00s has given way to mumbled, off beat rapping. In reuniting Pusha T and Malice have delivered an album weirdly nostalgic for a time when hip hop was hard core and crack was taking lives, which is simultaneously exciting and sad at the same time.