The original Lyricist Lounge was a rallying point for concious hip-hop. With contributions like Talib Kweli's "Manifesto", "The Body Rock", and Saul
William's "Elohim", it was as if the Afrocentric era of the early 90s had been born again. Diversity and social awareness were again being combined with raw beats and mic skills. But just as the Native Tongues popular appeal fell in the face of the industry's Death Rows and Bad Boys, the second edition of Lyricist Lounge is a bit, sort of...thuggish. The first track, an short acapella of Biggie's recorded live in '93, sets the agenda for the rest of the LP.

The compilation proper kicks in with "Oh No", the first single. It's a plucked-guitar Rockwilder beat with Mos Def and Pharoahe Monch trading verses and a slightly silly Nate Dogg chorus ("Oh no, n*ggas ain't scared to hustle...). Mos Def seems relatively comfortable with the East-West style dichotomy, doing his Everyman of hip-hop, but Monch sticks out like a sore thumb, his blazing verse almost too much for the track to take.

The thuggish business: MOP come with a reasonable effort, a shouty epic with
Kool G Rap, but it's no "Ante Up". Prodigy from Mobb Deep, and a mate, rhyme
hard on the Alchemist-produced "Grimy Way", but it's no "Shook Ones". The
outstanding tracks on the compilation are actually pretty non-thugly: the
Erick Sermon and Dilated Peoples tunes.

Erick produces his own track, "Battle", a tight, bouncy, bass-driven number
(with superb use of a "Rock The Bells" sample) and proceeds to kick verses in
the classic slack-jawed, I-have-my-mouth-full-of-hamburger EPMD style. He uses repitition of words, sounds and phrases as a gimmick. Newcomer Sy Scott
provides a solid effort, linking the battle theme with computer games and shit.

Dilated People must feel as if they're on a DJ Muggs compilation, surrounded by
tough-sounding eejits and solely responsible for bringing the goods for true
heads. Deliver they do, though, on a fantastic phased-keys Alchemist beat, with
their typical semi-abstract stop-start style. Check this one out, it's why I
bought the damn comp.

So, the conclusion is: this is not the milestone for intelligent independent
thought that Vol I was. The Lyricist Lounge boys could do well to listen to
Gangstarr's "Just to Get a Rep" a couple times and bring a collection as
diverse and yet coherent as Volume I. In the words of Jeru: With all that big
gun talk, money, you're playin' yaself.