Posted on 09/29/2005

 

Who is Medina Green? Sure, they're the cats that brought us "Crosstown Beef", the group that features Mos Def and family (brother DCQ and cousin Magnetic) but who are they really: indie rap's answer to D-12, another sad casualty of Rawkus' demise, an underground crew that can't live up to its potential? Medina Green evokes fond memories from those who ponder whimsically one of the umpteenth independent hip-hop renaissances, specifically the one spearheaded by Rawkus in the late 90s along with Company Flow, Reflection Eternal, Pharoahe Monch and others. But now it's the double grand and El-P says he'd rather be orally copulated by German socialists than have anything to do with the former razor-blade wielding record label. Mos Def has built himself into an industry (to paraphrase Jay-Z's fun but awkward wordplay, "he's not a businessman, he's a business, man"); the Mighty Mos Def hosts Def Jam's slam poetry night, acts alongside two-headed aliens, and has expanded his musical repertoire to front a rock band (for better or worse). Back in Brooklyn though, it looks like the brother of Mos is still putting it down, trying to carve out a traditional niche in today's blinged-out netherworld.

Unfortunately when the album should bring the energy of a Brooklyn block party, it drags and sways with a production mix that confirms too well its classification as "mixtape". Mos Def shines on his tracks, and it's no disrespect to the rest of the crew to say that the album needs more of him; even when he's in slam poetry 101 mode piling on lists of nouns and verbs, Mos Def just brings a sparkle and confident charm that makes you want more. To hear the throwback track "Fla-La-Lashe" (formerly the b-side of "Crosstown Beef"), which starts with a beatbox and then melts into a track driven with jangly percussion and plaintive but bright horns, almost teases the listener as it transports the audience back to solid classic New York hip hop.

Following two tracks later, "Medina Green Giants"—a classic static and subdued horn track from the Beatminerz—doesn't hurt the mix with its understated energy that gets the head bop with a little side-to-side.

The album doesn't sustain the feeling with well-intentioned tracks like "Momma Said", that preaches some sort of message but doesn't congeal with its showery synths and a noise saw rejected from the Liks "Make Room". "Sometimes" seems like a contest between the MCs to see who came rhyme the slowest without getting completely off-beat. Those sleepwalking tracks frustrate: particularly songs like "Physical Challenge"—a hard hitting track Medina Green pulls off even without Mos Def, shouting a hook in harmony with an energy that makes the group sound like an east of the Mississippi Jurassic 5.

Medina Green needs to get to the lab, get a grip, come equipped, and—yeah—get Mos Def on more of the tracks. If not for Medina Green, then for those of us fiending to hear him on less "rock and roll" inflected tracks. (I'm kidding! I love Black Jack Johnson…conceptually!)

There's a classic album bubbling somewhere beneath the surface, and at times simmering to the top. If these kids would just get a single producer, say a throwback hero like Diamond D or Pete Rock, and bang out an album…that shit would be pleasant to the ears like phone sex with Lauryn Hill.

*apologies to Breezly Brewin for biting his line off Co Flow's "Fire in Which You Burn" and Fondle 'Em Records who brought just as many Kool-Aid smiles in the late 90s as Rawkus.