6 / 10
'Fantastic Volume II' was, for a while, gold dust on the hip-hop bootleg circuit. Set for release in autumn '98, a record company merger saw it placed on the back-burner. Meanwhile, bootleggers got their hands on the promos, and the Detroit-based Slum Village suddenly became the hottest sound from the underground.
) is delivered with urchin charm.
It's when Slum Village try to raise the stakes that 'Fantastic Volume II' flounders. 'CB4' is shrouded in a super-tight new-skool production, a chant of, "Fellatio/Interference/ Promiscuous/Homo sapien" over hissy R&B snare. Nice enough, for 1998. But with the crack troops of the Rawkus empire staring grimly from the sidelines, and Dr Dre and Ice Cube returning, gangsta guns a-blazin', it all lacks a certain urgency. Slum Village ain't playas, they just rap a lot. In 2000, that's not enough.
10
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