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 Wished. That album was a heaving slab of Dice’s prickly rap vitriol bolstered by a collection 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 Wished with the extra conceptual-focused songwriting the MC would discover in earnest on the next 12 months’s traditional Demise Certificates undertaking.
Fronted by {a photograph} of Dice providing a firearm to the listener, the seven-song Kill At Will is a compact and forceful pay attention. Lyrical themes and musical tones are bookended collectively in a stylistically abrupt means: A remix of “Endangered Species (Tales From The Darkish Aspect)” from AmeriKKKa’s Most Wished weaves additional wails of electrical guitar into the combination as Dice and visitor Chuck D construct on the emotions of the music’s opening sampled information report: “On the backside of our information tonight, there’s been a brand new animal aimed within the course of falling off the face of the Earth. Sure, younger black youngsters are reported to be the oldest, and the latest, creatures added to the endangered species record.”
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 continually shifting backdrop of unique 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 happen to’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: “However I don’t get together and shake my butt/ I depart that to the brothers with the humorous haircuts.”
Deeper into Kill At Will, the highly effective back-to-back run of “The Product” and “Lifeless Homiez” highlight Dice’s conceptual prowess. Fueled by a frantic melange of funk samples, “The Product” presents Dice in offended sociology professor mode, as he tells a whirlwind life story that strikes from conception to inevitable incarceration. “My life is f***ed however it ain’t my fault ’trigger I’m the motherf***ing product,” slams Dice in the course of the music’s closing strains.
Then comes “Lifeless Homiez,” a plaintive lament on pals murdered in gang-related shootings that incorporates a somber Dice. “I keep in mind we painted our names on the wall for enjoyable/ Now it’s relaxation in peace after each one/ Besides me, however I ain’t the one to entrance/ Looks as if I’m viewing a physique each different month,” raps Dice, earlier than conjuring an emotive scene: “When it’s a tragedy, that’s the one time that the household’s tight/ Loving one another in a caring temper/ There’s a lot of individuals and plenty of meals/ They are saying be robust and also you’re attempting/ However how robust are you able to be whenever you see your pops crying?”
Hearken to Ice Dice’s Kill at Will now.