Ice-T is on of rap’s forgotten leaders and an intelligent musician. What is pathetic about this fact is that he basically invented silky gangster rap single handily in the early 80s. Chances are most people know him by name but have never heard one lyric spit from lips. Ice-T, born Tracy Morrow, is known as a west coast emcee but was originally born in Newark, New Jersey. He moved to California in the early 1970’s as a teenager after both of his parents were killed in a horrendous car accident. While in high school he began to write countless amounts songs to further develop his skills as rapper, and it was in high school that he first coined his alias, Ice T from a famous Los Angles pimp who turned to an activist/writer Iceberg Slim. After leaving high school, he began recording various songs on 12” singles, that I unfortunately couldn’t even find the name of any of those singles.

Those singles however caught the eye of the executives at Sire Records and he landed his first record deal. In 1987, he began recording songs for his debut album, Rhyme Pays. Filled with sampled filed production and party orientated rhymes which was the juncture of hiphop at the moment and the album received praise, helping to create a very strong fan base, which is why the album went gold. With the influence and money he gained from his first album and other sources, Ice T formed his own label called Rhyme Syndicate the very next year. During this time in 1988, Ice T released his sophomore effort Power. While Rhyme Pays danced on the line of gangster and the mainstream portion of rap, Power defined what it meant to be a silky smooth crime kingpin. Now it’s hailed as one of the first and one of the best gangster rap albums ever released. Guess what, they were NOT lying…

1. Intro (NOT RATED)
2. Power (5 Stars)
3. Drama (4 Stars)
4. Heartbeat (4 Stars)
5. The Syndicate f. Donald-D, Hen Gee, DJ Evil E (5 Stars)
6. Radio Suckers (5 Stars)
7. I’m Your Pusher (5 Stars)
8. Personal ( 5 Stars)
9. Girls L.G.B.N.A.F (4 Stars)
10. High Rollers (5 Stars)
11. Grand Larceny (5 Stars)
12. Soul On Ice (5 Stars)

With the Intro just announcing the arrival of the album, we just skip ahead to first track which is the charisma filled Power. Production wise we have an uptempo drumming bassline with low screeching horns in the background to add energy to overall feel of the track. Lyrics wise, Ice-T explains the exact means you need to have a position of power. He enlightens us with everything he has that has given him power and tidbits on what you need to also be in power, which is popularity, control, and of course the most important item money. Basically, this is your typical braggadocio track but because of Ice T’s fiery punchlines catapults this song to one of the best on the entire album One in particular that I had me rewind, so you say that I am a fake fake, you really must be a fool, I’ve been in jail more times then you’ve probably been in school! Damn, that wasn’t very complex but it was catchy as hell wasn’t it? Especially for someone who has been in the school system for what seems like an eternity.

Ever since his debut Ice T has shown that he is not all about just spitting gangster raps but he has shown give you an insight on the harshness of inner street life. Drama is an example this other portion of his lyrical landscape. He does each verse from the point of view of gangster and ends just about every verse with the arrival of the police. The redundancy of the police showing up to break whatever action is taking place, is to give you example of how irritating their presence really are to someone living a life of crime. There are only two real problems I had with the song, which was the simplistic but lackluster production that was just uninspiring and boring (though it doesn’t take away from the song too much). He also seemed to purposely decided to dumbed down his vocabulary and structure of his rhymes to create an almost poetic feel to the rhymes themselves (probably a shoutout to his “mentor” Iceberg). The last few lines of the track prove this:


Killers and robbers are all you great
Act soft you will get beat
On death row they got their own hot seat
For those who feel that they are truly elite
The last thing you see's a priest
The lights dim - your life ends

The Syndicate, is the only posse joint found on this entire album, that’s a rarity nowadays to have only one crew track. The song features some underground rappers that are involved in Ice T’s Rhyme Syndicate group/label that I have never heard of until hearing this song called Donald D, Hen Gee, and a decent DJ named Evil E. Each of the emcee spit above average verses but Ice T steals the show with a great delivery and punchlines. The highlight of the track is when he throws shots at rappers just sit there and brag about how great they are while spitting weak lyrics.

Essentially a remix of Curtis Mayfield’s Pusherman, I’m You Pusher for some odd reason confused the message it was sending to the general public. For some odd reason critics believed the song was supporting drug use (chances are they were just looking for something negatives to name about a rap album). Title itself must have been it but this not a track promoting the usage of drugs. Instead, Ice gives a creative track where he uses the selling of drugs as a metaphor for delivering people wonderful hiphop music. The production has only a few elements comprising the entire beat includes some cello strings, a drum loop, and low clapping bassline. The lyricism is advanced for the time with some great metaphoric lines and if you do not really listen at times it does sounds as if he speaking about actually selling drugs but he gives it away too many times to believe the idea completely. He uses some time to throw a shot at LL Cool J during an intermission but it’s not all that serious.

Personal is where Ice T gets really serious and goes on an all out attack on all people whom he feud up with. His flow sounds just sounds plain angry here since he ups the intensity on track. Speaking of intensity, the beat expresses that intensity perfectly with those two hard guitar riffs and a loud thumping bassline. At first he attacks the fake emcee haters that emerged since he became a star and warns of all methods of retaliation he will resort to if they continue bothering him. One point he sounds sick as f*ck as he spits many lines at once almost making it sound like one long winded sentence. Remember that little shot at LL Cool J that I mention earlier? Well, the next verse he focuses entirely on LL with some hilarious and quite a few hard hitting lines. He never mentions his name but he does say you should know who are if I’m talking about and they were beefing at time. He ends the verse with a memorable finisher, Illin on a mega-villain, you must want a pine box to go chill in, buried deep, creep, no one will weep, cause the next night with your bitch I'll sleep WHOO!

The most famous track off of this entire album and was the lead single, High Rollers. He adapts the psuedo-poetic style that was used on the song Drama to convey the storytelling element of the song. The track deals with the lifestyle of those high profile drug traffickers and underworld crime bosses. To be simple, how much their life is better then everyone else’s but it comes with a heavy price but at no point does he ever deliver the message that you should make you choose a life of crime over a life lived on the straight path. He even pays homage to the high rollering females showing that his knowledge to their specific way of living. This track just showcases balance as an emcee as he isn’t a one-dimensional rapper and using all his ability here that makes this song a classic.

Soul On Ice, the closing track on an already incredible sees Ice T changing his style to how the poet Iceberg Slim would do during his poem. It’s not a rap song per se but rather Ice T spitting a poem over an unsophisticated beat. The story entails the day a gangster turns his back on his corrupt and decides to live a life of good. As he was preparing to get ready to live his first day as a new man, his life takes a dramatic turn for the worst as someone attempts to assassinate him. The moral of the story really is that no matter what happen eventually your past is going to catch up with you even if change how you live.

Power, unlike most sophomore albums where you find the artist taking a step back from where they were on their debut because they have lost their hunger, gives us a more well rounded album then seen on Rhyme Pays. From the production which can change from being soulful to jazzy to uptempo. Lyrically, Ice T shows growth as an emcee because just about every track is no longer party orientated. The problem with old school albums such as this that is heavy with the gangster rhymes are that you see where commercial has gained some of its ideals from. Instead of getting horrible rhymes though we are shown how the style should be used and being used by someone with ability to write a song. Another setback keeping this album from being timeless is there are no well-written hooks or chorus. Majority of the time only thing separating verse is the track title being said over and over again. Not a really pressing pitfall but it does hold this album back. Even though this album is over 15 years old I see no reason why you cannot still add it to your collection of hiphop album, unless you think Chingy is top 5 dead or alive. Hell, if you think that then you should not be reading this, you should contemplating suicide…



4.5 rounded up to 5 Stars


Recommended: Yes