Rap Critic Reviews: “Gangsta’s Paradise” by Coolio ft. L.V. Rap Critic

Hi. I'm the Rap Critic. Let's talk about Coolio. Now, I don't think pop music history as a whole has been very kind to Coolio, since as far as I can remember, everyone's kind of taken him to be a bit of a joke, a rapper to not be taken seriously. When you talk about the biggest names in hiphop in the 90's, the names that are often tossed around are cats like Biggie Smalls, Wu-Tang, Snoop Dogg, Ice Cube, LL Cool J, and Nas, but I almost never hear any praise for Coolio, which is interesting, because, I mean, he wasn't a bad rapper or anything, he was decent enough, and the man had multiple hits back in the day, and in fact, the song I'm reviewing today, became the first rap song to be number 1 on the billboards year-end charts, so people knew who he was, and, I think people still know who he is, he's not some obscure reference that time forgot, I just think that, well, people don't really respect Coolio as far as Hiphop is concerned, and, hey, I get it, the guy's name is a portmanteau of "cool" and "yo", his name couldn't sound like a more cheesy "urban" buzzword if he called himself "nahmean-nahmsayin", and yeah, at the height of his fame, he did rap the theme song for a kids' t.v. show, definitely not the most gangsta thing to do in hindsight, but I'll defend that move, because, hey, Kenan and Kel was a good show, and he never struck me as someone who was trying to be a super thug or anything, But hey, honestly: it was the hair, wasn't it? Yeah, it was probably the hair. I mean, few things are gonna make you look like a comical portrayal of hip hop's aggressiveness than gravity defying braids. *I refuse to bow down to any law written by a white man, and neither will my hair!* But yeah, while I think the zero G braids were cool, it's not exactly the most toned down look you could have. I mean, if the only other rapper rocking' a similar hairstyle to you is this guy:

*show ODB with hair*

You might wanna go for something different if you want to be taken seriously. It's also not helping that, despite the fact that he's currently balding, he's decided to keep his braids up, on the two little islands of hair left on his head. Dude, cut that off, man! Go out with some dignity! *looks over* Oh, what's that? He's doing soundtracks for porn websites now? …alright… And I will say that, in addition, it's not like "Gangsta's Paradise was the only type of music he was making. His first hit was actually this:

"Fantastic Voyage"

Yeah, a lot of his stuff was actually a lot more party oriented, but with a hardcore rap slant to it. And actually, if you think about it, his first smash hit was a song that actually serves as a transitional point for what was happening in hiphop at the time. "Fantastic Voyage" was released in 1994, the time period in Hiphop where rap in the mainstream charts was losing it's grip on happy dance music like C+C Music factory and Kid n Play in favor of hardcore rap like 2Pac and Bone Thugz N Harmony dominating the charts. And "Fantastic Voyage" represented the harder edge of that party music, but a lighter side of gangsta funk, with the bouncing bass and synth sounds commonly associated with Dr. Dre's style of harsher, thugged out rap personas, while the song, indeed incorporating themes of ghetto culture, had a main message about Coolio wishing he could close his eyes and escape the dangers of his neighborhood

Come on y'all let's take a ride
Don't you say shit just get inside

Close your eyes and hit the switch
We're going to a place where everybody kick it

A Place where my kids can play outside
Without living in fear of a drive-by

And ya know, where this song encapsulated the transition of trends in mainstream rap, this happier joint wasn't the one people remembered the most. The one that topped the charts and solidified Coolio into the minds of millions was the song, "Gangsta's Paradise". This, in my eyes, is the quintessential song that represented Hiphop's identity as a genre and at the same time, echoed the mind set of Black culture in American Society in the 90's. In fact, I'd dare say that few songs that got this popular in the 90's really summed up the overall feel of the decade, at least as far as hiphop and it's young audience was concerned

*video starts*

You know, I actually think that, in addition to this song being good, this is quite an audacious music video here, A because it's one of the very few music videos for a song on a movie's soundtrack that actually tried to incorporate what was happening in the movie clips with what was happening in the actual video (seriously, how many music videos have you watched where they just randomly throw clips or t.v. screens in there showing parts of a movie that has absolutely nothing to do with the context of the video?), and B, because it ties so well into the movie that this is from, "Dangerous Minds", a movie about an upper class teacher coming into a poor neighborhood to get the hardest kids to teach interested in learning. Now, I can't tell you how good the movie is at portraying this, as I haven't seen it in a while, but I don't remember it being too terrible; however, the way they tie it into the music video itself, actually having Michelle Pfeiffer in the video for a cameo, was pretty cool. And then, she says the line:

"You wanna tell me what this is all about"