Wu-Tang Clan

The Wu-Tang Clan's debut album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) wasn't an across-the-boards blockbuster like Dr. Dre's The Chronic, the other seminal hip-hop record of the early '90s, but its impact was just as widespread. Where Dr. Dre was loose, hedonistic, and funky, the Wu-Tang was tense, scary, and funny. Enter the Wu-Tang is a series of intense, surrealistic soundscapes that draw equally from pop culture, martial arts, and gangsta traditions. Other hardcore gangstas simply boasted about their hardness -- the Wu-Tang clan boasted, but they supported their inventive rhymes with stripped-down samples and lean, menacing beats that evoked their gritty, urban surroundings more effectively than their words. And that's what makes Enter the Wu-Tang so effective -- the group's unique lyrical obsessions and the distinctive, innovative production techniques of Prince Rakeem. After releasing this pioneering debut, all the members pursued solo careers that explored various elements of Enter the Wu-Tang in more depth -- and, occasionally, with more effective results -- but this contains the roots of everything that followed. [Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) was also released in a "clean" edition, containing no profanities or vulgarities.] ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide