‘Baby U… Uhh… He a psychopathic… He a psychopathic thinker…’

I moved house at the weekend, to a pretty central apartment. I feel like my perspective of the city has shifted, like places have repositioned themselves on the map. I’ve fixed the place up a bit too, put some posters on the walls, something familiar - make myself feel a bit more comfortable. Not that I’m some kind of trauma victim.
I also discovered, after dribbling so much soup on the tablecloth that I had to wash it, that the table in the kitchen has a fucking chessboard INSIDE IT. It’s mind expanding.

When I was packing up, I found myself playing ‘Enter the Wu Tang’ over and over. There isn’t any point in calling it my favourite hip hop album, but it might be.
A memory came back to me when I was listening to this, and by busting it out here I accept that I don’t sound too ghetto, too street.

I was in the back of the car on the way to my Auntie and Uncle’s house in Sunderland. We were going to have some kind of family dinner.
I was halfway through the album (I’d had it for a while, maybe only the fourth rap album I bought) when things kind of fell into place. Looking back now, I remember hearing the line

‘Steamrolling niggas like an eighteen wheeler with a drunk driver driving, there’s no surviving’

and rap music seemed to click. At the time, this song reminded me of a tune called Cold Duck Time, recorded at the Montreux Jazz Festival with Les McCann, Eddie Harris and Benny Bailey trading breathless solos. Anyway, pretty thrilled, I reached over to my brother, tapped him on the shoulder and passed him the headphones. He listened for a while, shrugged and gave me them back.

I still don’t think that there is much that can touch this album, thirteen years after it was released. Aside from the production and lyrics, the contrast in the rappers’ voices is amazing, like they are all instrumental virtuosos. RZA rasps, Ol Dirty is unpredictable and unhinged, Ghostface sounds young and comprehensible.
It is full of great lines, too.

‘I bake the cake, then take the cake and eat it too, with my crew while we head state to state’

‘Throw your shitty drawers in a hamper, next time come strapped with a fucking pamper’

‘Here I go, deep fried flow, Jacques Cousteau could never hit this, yo’

‘For crying out loud, my style is wild, so book me,
not long is how long this rhyme took me’

‘Turn the other cheek and I’ll break your fucking chin’

‘There’s no place to hide once I step inside the room,
Dr Doom, prepare for the boom!
Bam! Ah man! I slam!
Damn! I scream like Tarzan!’

My friend came round for a cup of tea yesterday afternoon, and when she took my copy out of the CD player, we discovered that it was broken, almost in piecez. Tired. Still, word.
Yes. And did you hear? Whitney Houston is on crack.