When Ice Dice left N.W.A. in a storm cloud of controversy, the firebrand Los Angeles rapper asserted his solo clout with 1990’s AmeriKKKa’s Most Needed. That album was a heaving slab of Dice’s prickly rap vitriol bolstered by a number of raucous funk-fortified backdrops crafted by Public Enemy’s East Coast manufacturing unit The Bomb Squad. Designed to construct on the thrill of Dice’s solo debut, the Kill At Will EP arrived in December of the identical 12 months and managed to stability the perspective and anger of AmeriKKKa’s Most Needed with the extra conceptual-focused songwriting the MC would discover in earnest on the next 12 months’s basic Loss of life Certificates challenge.
Fronted by {a photograph} of Dice providing a firearm to the listener, the seven-song Kill At Will is a compact and forceful hear. Lyrical themes and musical tones are bookended collectively in a stylistically abrupt method: A remix of “Endangered Species (Tales From The Dark Side)” from AmeriKKKa’s Most Needed weaves further wails of electrical guitar into the combo as Dice and visitor Chuck D construct on the feelings of the track’s opening sampled information report: “At the bottom of our news tonight, there’s been a new animal aimed in the direction of falling off the face of the Earth. Yes, young black teenagers are reported to be the oldest, and the newest, creatures added to the endangered species list.”
Hearken to Ice Dice’s Kill at Will now.
The socio-political reportage that fires “Endangered Species” is straight away adopted by the audacious Chilly Chill-crafted “Jackin’ For Beats.” Rapping over a continuously shifting backdrop of authentic sampled sources and instrumentals related to tracks by contemporaries together with Public Enemy, Digital Underground, and LL Cool J, Dice asserts his proper to take and repurpose beats at a whim. “And even if you’re down with my crew, I’ll jack them too,” the MC brags as a snatch of Public Enemy’s “Welcome To The Terrordome” is punched in, earlier than continuing to embrace Digital Underground’s “The Humpy Dance” with a curmudgeonly quip: “But I don’t party and shake my butt/ I leave that to the brothers with the funny haircuts.”
Deeper into Kill At Will, the highly effective back-to-back run of “The Product” and “Dead Homiez” highlight Dice’s conceptual prowess. Fueled by a frantic melange of funk samples, “The Product” presents Dice in indignant sociology professor mode, as he tells a whirlwind life story that strikes from conception to inevitable incarceration. “My life is f***ed but it ain’t my fault ’cause I’m the motherf***ing product,” slams Dice throughout the track’s closing strains.
Then comes “Dead Homiez,” a plaintive lament on associates murdered in gang-related shootings that encompasses a somber Dice. “I remember we painted our names on the wall for fun/ Now it’s rest in peace after every one/ Except me, but I ain’t the one to front/ Seems like I’m viewing a body every other month,” raps Dice, earlier than conjuring an emotive scene: “When it’s a tragedy, that’s the only time that the family’s tight/ Loving each other in a caring mood/ There’s lots of people and lots of food/ They say be strong and you’re trying/ But how strong can you be when you see your pops crying?”
Hearken to Ice Dice’s Kill at Will now.
