It's The Return Of The Hip Hop Freaks! Nice & Smooth Posted by Junior

Nice & Smooth: Doin' Our Own Thang and Old To The New From: Jewel of the Nile [RAL, 1994] Nice & Smooth are a funny kind of rap duo. Never gaining massive commercial success they still managed to carve out a decent career over four albums achieving Gold status each and every time. Widely recognised and appreciated within the hip hop community you can find either Greg Nice, Smooth B, or both, popping up on many of the biggest albums of the early nineties yet they tended to keep guest spots on their own albums to one track. Sometimes dismissed as light rappers due to their stylised rhyme delivery the duo are actually top drawer on subject matter and delivery with a playful wit and rhyme flow that stands up to scrutiny today. Over the years I've got more than my money's worth out of their first two albums, released in 89 and 91, but in all this time I never tended to revisit their third release, Jewel In The Nile. The main reason for this is that by the time it came out in 1994 I felt like hip hop had moved on with the emergence of a new breed or rappers and production style in the likes of Wu-Tang, Biggie, Nas and Snoop. Revisiting the album now I feel ashamed for sleeping for so long. Full of great production and the expected lyrical play from the duo I've been bumping this again for the last week or so non stop. Doin Our Own Thang is quite possibly the perfect title for a Nice & Smooth track because, you know, they always do. Kicking off with a little beatboxing this track is catchy as hell and the kind of sunshine hiphop they specialised in - so much fun. In my opinion at I think Nice holds the lyrical top spot for the first couple of albums but Smooth B definitely comes up on this album - check his verse on this involving everything from Hansel and Gretel to placentas. Fantastic. Old To The New once again displays Nice & Smooth's lyrical deftness. As mentioned earlier, don't get distracted by their rapping style, their lyrics are always worth keeping an ear open to for the "did he really just say that?" factor alone. On a side note, my credits tell me this track was produced by Luis "Phat Kat" Vega - no relation to the house supremo I assume? Although not featured here I would highly recommend purchasing their first two releases as a matter of necessity and can now add their third album to the list of records never to leave my playlist again. I never did pick up their fourth release though, anyone got good news on how that matches up?