Scarface: Greatest Hits : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Great gangsta rap is lurid, for sure, but at its best it's got a fatalistic weight to it. And no one in the history of hip-hop has done morbidity as well as Scarface. A barrel-voiced Houston MC, Face knows how to tell a dark tale, as seen here on the depressive "Now I Feel Ya" and "I Seen a Man Die." "Born Killer" is an aggressive gem from early in his career, and Face's underrated raunchy side gets play with lighthearted sex romps such as "Goin' Down."

Scarface began his career with the Geto Boys, alongside the irrepressible, diminutive Bushwick Bill and the mush-mouthed Willie D. Thanks to their punishingly explicit lyrics, they were among the most reviled acts of the early Nineties, one of the few notorious rap groups as familiar to right-wing moralists as to fans. But what the Geto Boys specialized in was great theater: "Six Feet Deep" and "Mind of a Lunatic" are among hip-hop's most chilling moments, full of palpable alienation and sadness.

JON CARAMANICA
(RS 911 – December 12, 2002)