By Ken Walker
It’s the biggest and best Oreo in the music industry. It’s Jurassic 5; maybe you know them as J5. Four African-American MCs and two Caucasian DJs make up this hip-hop clan. Fresh and ready for a new Interscope album to drop on October 8, listeners see these “Acetate Prophets” (a DJ track summing up the album’s end) take their music to a much-anticipated higher level. Power In Numbers creates new collaborations with Big Daddy Kane (“A Day At The Races”), Nelly Furtado (“Thin Line”) and the Beatnuts (“One of Them”).
Quality Control was Jurassic’s first full length LP, debuting in 2000, and had hip-hop reminiscent of De La Soul, Tribe, and the Jungle Brothers. Power In Numbers steps forward and moves the J5 out of that category of “can’t do much more than group rhyme” hip-hop. Their old school sound makes it virtually impossible to expand, but Cut Chemist and DJ Nu Mark kill the beats and breaks with freshness listeners might never even associate with Jurassic 5.
Then there’s that track with Nelly- not St. Louis’ hip-hop (oops, cRap) sellout, but Nelly Furtado. The soul/funk/R&B/alternative singer. With a Canadian/Latin-laced voice, she melds her high-pitched vocals to a Cut Chemist beat and makes the next “You Got Me,” called “Thin Line.”
Their new single, “What’s Golden,” produced by DJ Nu Mark, utilizes a sample of Public Enemy’s “On The Stage…” It was spotted at number 5 on “106 and Park.” So look out; J5 is catching up to the contracted cash money makers, invading your television and radios with that “word power/that can plow through acres of corn fields” as 2na bops on “What’s Golden.” As shocking as this album is, there are spots for the DJs to shine, letting listeners know Cut Chemist and DJ NuMark can, sure enough, produce solo albums in those realms of instrumentals like Dr. Octagon, DJ Shadow and RJD2. These guys don’t front or fake when it comes to breaks, and as we see with “Thin Line,” rhythm and blues tracks are producible as well.
Since the days in 1993 when two groups came together in Los Angeles to form Jurassic 5, the artists have come a long way with music, lyric, and beat. Cut Chemist and Chali 2na also work closely with a funk group called Ozomatli, that is just as different as similar to J5. In 1997, J5 released an EP, to be re-released in 1999. And with a torturous touring schedule, these guys used to be too busy to record a full-length LP. However, fresh off their opening act on the Smoking Grooves tour, which featured amazements like Lauryn Hill, Outkast and the Roots, concertgoers were blasted away by the funky stage antics of the one and only J5. There are a few miss hits on the album, but it is nearly flawless and sure to surprise any listener with new or traditional ears pasted in hip-hop. Let us not forget the difference in positive soul filled hip-hop that increases the mind’s processes and not confuse that genre with rap or pop that disintegrates the brain and washes it into a crumply and wet dollar bill. Jurassic 5 are hitting the world Tuesday, October 8th, with Power In Numbers, which is sure to inspire the numbered masses of this nation.
CARDINAL GRADE: B-
