Spice 1 - Spice 1 (1992)

Coolin on the corner with the cellular phone

you can tell that the East Bay was his home

More mail than the rest of the pushers

cuz he’s got a technine in the bushes

Spice 1 self titled record is by many considered a classic, with good reason. How often can you listen to an entire disc from 1992 without feeling atleast some of the tracks sound a little bit dated? Till last week I hadn't listend to this record in, eh, a long long too long time. One of those records I used to bumb the shit out of when I was younger, had even less benjamins to spend on music and didn't know sheit about computers.


Point is nowdays I tend to never listen to the same album as much and so intense as I did as a younsta, there's to much music to here and to little time. I wish the week had 12 days and each day 40 hours, then I'd prah'lee even have time to learn listening to all that brit pop and drum n bass or whatever my friends tryn' tell me about haha.. Anyhoo, Spice 1's selftitled album is one of those albums I grew up with, I listend to it 24/7 for weeks, months. Whenever I didn't listen to it I might have listend to a Biggie Smalls or Eazy-E record, but that was it. So this a littlbe bit of my childhood I'm giving you.

Actually thinking of it, do I like this record so much because of how much I've listend to it or because it's jammin? Not so sure. To the music. Spice 1's Spice 1 is the first real full length album from the Texas born rapper and truly I have no idea how big this record was back then. I was six when it dropped and honestly I hadn't found out about bay area gangsta rap. Shit I couldn't even speak English back then. This record might be all over the web or more or less unknown, I really don't know.

Spice 1's deliverly is hard as hell. He's vicious gangsta rapper and this record is seriously some of the most gutter shit I've ever heard. He raps about violence, prostitution, the dope game and he does it without analyzing too much. He's more kinda accepting and bitter over the common every day life of the young black ghetto resident. With an ironic tone too it. Eh. Short spoken, shit that sounded amazingly hard and facinated the my young mind. I still feel the early 90's west coast gangsta rap was some of the realest most authentic music ever. It doesn't feel like a trick to sell records or anything. Which does kinda matter.

Oh, if anything is misspelled, it's 'cause I'm a hip hop head. We don't learn grammar in the south ye heearr... haha

Beatwise it's some funky hardcore shit. Legendary bay area producers Ant Banks and E-A Ski does most of the work. Other production credits goes to Black Jack, CMT and Spice 1 himself. Best tracks: 183 Proof, East Bay Gangster, Welcome To The Ghetto, aahhw shit the whole reocord is dope. Give this a listen. I have to go back to work. Peace

I couldn't find my copy of the disc at home so I can't say who produced which track, but I'll be sure to edit the post once i find it!

Spice 1 (1992)

Tracklist:

1. In My Neigborhood
2. 187 Proof
3. East Bay Gangster (Reaggae)
4. Money Gone
5. 1-800-Spice
6. Peace To My Nine
7. Young Nigga
8. Welcome To The Ghetto
9. Fucked In The Game
10. Money Or Murder
11. City Streets
12. 1-900-Spice
13. Break Yourself

Internet:
http://www.myspace.com/spiceone