Not long before hip-hop gave way to gangsta rap in the late '80s, Rakim was the new-school MC of the moment, using a smooth baritone to become the jazz soloist of mystic Afrocentric rap. Along with his street-militant Strong Island alter ego, Chuck D of Public Enemy, Rakim reigned with metaphoric weapons – the microphone and a numerological method of urban storytelling. Fusing spacey Bambaata...