Search: All Products Books Popular Music Classical Music Video DVD Toys & Games Computer & Video Games Electronics Software Tools & Hardware Outdoor Living Kitchen & Housewares Camera & Photo Wireless Phones Keywords:

You can now catch The Cipher at www.thehiphopcipher.com!

Maybe it’s because he spoiled us with three unforgettable albums in less than two years. Or maybe it was just that voice. Maybe we were fiending for more of the anthemic-like chest beating of "What’s My Name" or the testosterone-filled queries of "What Bi****** Want." Or maybe it was just that growling spitfire delivery we couldn’t get out of our head. Maybe it was simply that " Party Up"- that crazy up-tempo club jam that kept us rocking months after the most recent And Then There Was X album leveled off at 5x platinum was still insane on the brain. For whatever the reason, lately we’ve been thinking about DMX, the artist whose bald head and shoulder-to-shoulder dog tattoo had gotten kids around the world barking and rhyming in loud bursts of manic, ghetto energy. We’ve asked where he’s been, what he’s been doing, wondered when he was coming back on the scene. Well, the wait is over. The dog is back, people! It’s time for The Great Depression.

You thought I’d let you have this sh**?

You thought this rap shit was yours? You motherf***ers done lost your mind

His name is Earl Simmons, better known as the Dark Man X, and in three short years he has broken Billboard sales figures by debuting two albums at #1 within the same year (It’s Dark & Hell is Hot & Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood). He has set the radio waves on fire with hits like " Get At Me Dog", "Ruff Ryders Anthem", "Slippin", "It’s On", "What Bitches Want" and "Party Up." He has been on two record-breaking national tours, Survival of the Illest and Hard Knock Life and starred in two feature films, Hype William’s Belly and the box office smash Exit Wounds with Steven Seagal, whose $35 million first week take was the biggest ever for the action star. This was all after this deep-throated, bandana-wearing brotha from Yonkers, NY had permanently set the streets off with lyrics of fury on cuts like LL Cool J’s "4,3,2,1", Mic Geronimo’s "Usual Suspects", the Lox’s "Money, Power, Respect" and Mase’s "24 Hrs. 2 Live". Now this multi-platinum, global phenomenon, the person who almost single-handedly shifted hip-hop’s identity away from one of shiny suits and fancy cars to one defined by a survival-centered street life where heart, credibility, strength and loyalty meant as much as the phattest outfit or the baddest girl, is inviting us back into his bare chested world for a fourth album. No amateurs allowed. The Great Depression, perhaps the Dark Man’s finest work to date, is filled with the same stories of struggle and survival, pain and ability to get by that have signified this dog’s career. So be ready for more rhymes. More barks and growls. More hos and bitches. More niggas and neighborhoods. More beats. More love. And of course, more prayer. Much more prayer. For anyone that has followed X’s life and music knows that behind ever curse and growl there is a plea for forgiveness, behind every rage-filled tale of pain or deceit or vengeance there is a strong moral center. See, after close to 15 million records sold, DMX is still trying to open his heart to the worlds around him, still trying to expose his innermost feelings about life struggle to his fans. And he has not forgotten his commitment to uplift the hood communities he was born through all of his rhymes and all of his reasons. The Great Depression starts without a beat:

Sometimes I wonder what life’s about

Sometimes I wonder why the lights are out

Sometimes I wonder why I like to shout

Sometimes I wonder what the lies are about...

It’s the kind of introspective soul-searching that has made this man a hero among his peers turned this artist into an icon and set up the most anticipated record release of the year. But don’t get it twisted, for 2001 it’s clear to DMX that the music of his peers has gotten a little too pretty again, that the endless braggin’ and boastin’ about money and fame and pleasure and sex are getting a little too out of hand. The Dark Man is ready to do something about it. "One more time, I gots to hit the streets off, make the streets talk, let them know it ain’t a sweet walk," X spits on "Right Here" the album’s first single, a sure fire statement of purpose from a man whose reputation for battle rap is without peer. With its rolling bass line, hot kick track and harmonized chorus, "Right Here" is the perfect piece of street aggression for a game that will quickly realize it’s been without its grimiest player for a little too long. Ain’t no coming back in the morning like that shit was a dream, man, nigga you gone… Then quickly after Grease-produced "School St." finishes its runaway shout-out session, the dark "Who We Be" continues X’s descriptive list-making over a grinding cinematic head-banger destined to be the soundtrack for any young person’s life of contradiction and dilemma…the projects, the drugs, the children, the drugs, the tears, the hugs, the love, the slugs… These things are realities for too many of our young people, realities X knows only too well. Maybe that’s why Mr. Simmons spends many of his Christmas holidays at Harlem Hospital in the pediatric AIDS ward, or his Thanksgivings weekends in Yonkers, NY in the community center where he was raised as a teenager, giving out turkey dinners to the group home children in the area. Not to mention the Church down the street he saved from losing their lease by underwriting a six-figure settlement. Or the Mariela Hose Foundation (in honor of his late grandmother Mrs. Mariela Holloway) he’s starting with his wife’s help that will provide support for unwed teenage mothers. Appropriately, X honors the woman who bestowed her grandson with unforgettable love and affection on the moving "I Miss You." Written on a cold and tearful night in Buffalo, NY during a break from shooting Exit Wounds, and inspired by the melodic beat of new producer Black Key, "I Miss You" may stand out as the most personal song DMX has ever written. Under the form of a letter to his passed grandmother, X speaks from the heart about the state of his family, the trials and tribulations he’s been through as an adult and his unswerving devotion to the words of grandma, and the word of God. "Every woman has a grandma figure," X said that night. "If it’s not your actual grandmother, it’s your aunt or your sister or your mother. But as a child, everyone has that woman you know will take care of you". The simple hook, Baby it’s gon’ be okay, is sung by the remarkable Faith Evans, who previously worked with X on the remix to "How’s It Goin’ Down". Her deep, purring voice perfectly matches the power and emotion of X’s lyrics and sets up the beautiful "Amazing Grace" outro Faith sings with a Sunday-afternoon sincerity. In the tradition of "Slippin" and "How’s It Goin’ Down", "I Miss You" is destined to be an X ghetto-blues classic. Until it’s time to dance or should I say bang? "I’m A Bang" is the first of three up-tempo scorchers soon to be burning up the clubs coast to coast. With a fierce guitar solo prelude and call-and-response shout-it-loud chorus, "I’m A Bang" finds the Dark Man flying through the lands of haters and misbelievers with a spit-drooling energy that is unmatched anywhere on the urban music landscape. Only X could pull off a hip-hop ball of fire with such a heavy rock track. The Swizz-Beatz-produced "Get it on the Floor" demands that its audience ride to this motherfucker, bounce to this motherfucker while the 808-drenched "Trina Mo" brings famed producer Dame Grease back to the club floors in a major way. If you thought you already knew what the Harlem Shake was all about, check how it’s done to this record. Thug style. With crazy lyrics. "Here we go, here we go!" Then there’s the cover of Stephanie Mill’s "Whatcha Gonna Do", a song X uses to pose the question of how he would be treated without the fame and celebrity. Is the love gon’ be the same when, we start to realize that the game ends? / Even me, will I have the same friends? Even when I ain’t got the same Benz? / Whatcha gonna do when I’m nothing? The remake of this disco classic will no doubt be a summer banger especially when Ms. Mills came back and re-sung her vocals for this new version. But nothing can compare to the unyielding passion of "Bloodline Anthem (It’s Our Time)", named for the new record label DMX secured through Island/Def Jam last year. With a screeching chorus sung by new Jamaican mistress Badia, an undeniably hot guitar-swamped bass line and lyrics from the dark side of hell, "Bloodline Anthem" will answer any doubts about who got hip-hop on lock, and what game the dog is not playing:

I let y’all n***** live for a minute, you get groovy / Told you go ahead, drop a few albums I’ll do a movie / But when I come back, come on dog respect my slot / Ain’t no get in where I fit in, bitch I’m straight to the top / And whoever don’t like it, f*** you fa****, bring it / N***** don’t wanna walk it, but stay trying to sing it / What I got to start smacking you guys around again? / Don’t make no motherf***in’ sense y’all some grown ass men

X’s energy is in his delivery, in the unforgiving way he climbs on top of a rhyme, bites its head off and dives down its throat. Some have said he sounds possessed. X has already admitted that he is. And guess who’s back? "Damien", DMX’s devil-spawn alter ego makes a return appearance on The Great Depression, after last being heard on Flesh of my Flesh’s "The Omen" with Marilyn Manson. Hey D, it’s your nigga D, what you forgot about me? And so the dialogue continues. But thankfully, its two and a half minutes of eerie allegory is thankfully matched by the Swizz-produced "Got A Minute", perhaps the most important song on the album. "Got a Minute" is Earl’s dialogue with the Lord and the archangels Swizz found for the track blissfully accompany our hero all the way home to the end of the album and "Prayer IV". You go a minute for your son father? I need to talk So the wait is over. Eighteen years into a music career, four years into superstardom, DMX has managed to do it again. He’s stayed with the same creative team who he considers family: Producers Grease, PK, Swizz Beatz. And this time he’s been able to take it even further. It’s Dark & Hell Is Hot, Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood, And Then There Was X, and now The Great Depression. How does he do it? Because he chooses to tell the honest tales of a real life. For that he’s more than a rapper. Here the beats, listen to the words, understand the meaning. And get spoiled again.

TRACK LISTING: