Pharoahe Monch is one of the best MCs ever to have taken the mic into their hands. He’s playing in the same league as rhyming pioneers such as Kool G Rap, Slick Rick, Big Daddy Kane or Kool Keith. He’s an »MC’s MC«, your favorite MC’s favorite. Most of his lines have been carved in stone since his legendary Simply II Positive-demo, a guideline full of innovative puns with an ever positive spirit. Monch has seen it all, nothing can possibly rattle him, apart from maybe HipHop’s state of mind these days – a very good reason to be presenting his third solo-LP and to be waging war on today’s sick world. Of course, every now and then, Mister Thirteen has already presented political lyrics in the nineties, but they were complex and just too top-heavy for the ordinary B-Boy. W.A.R.’s appeal comes from 1.) Monch, in opposition to his previous record, now crowing with an exquisite selection of hand-picked MCs who never steal his thunder but instead perfectly complement his style, and 2.) him arranging his superior vocabulary under a main topic that he then breaks down into different subordinate categories. It’s a kind of conceptual album at times, in which the word itself makes A&R-guys get headaches. But what else should be expected from the man who, side by side with Prince Poetry, opened the doors for a legion of innovative rhyme-acrobats? Bloodless bullshit like today’s Hipsters are coming up with? Fuck it! Monch has got it all right.
Carmike
Comin’ At Yo Ass
Now-Again