Big Daddy Kane “Raw” (Remix)
Big Daddy Kane feat. Kool G. Rap “Raw” (Remix)

I’m feeling a little uninspired today, so we’re gonna go on a brief nostalgia trip. (Marley Marl’s House of Hits has been on heavy rotation in the car, for what it’s worth.)

Big Daddy Kane’s my favorite rapper of all-time, which sort of gives me away as an old fart with a Golden Age of Hip Hop fixation. His time in the sun was kind of brief by today’s standards–two and half classic albums followed by a precipitous falloff in the form of The Prince of Darkness, a wildly ill-conceived R&B effort that derailed his career. That lover-man persona was always his Achilles’ heel. Nonetheless, he’s being deservedly recognized today as a pioneer, innovator, legend.

“Raw,” a 1987 single and highlight of the following year’s debut LP Long Live the Kane, was Kane’s breakthrough. It propelled him out of Biz Markie’s shadow (stop laughing!) and to the forefront of NYC hip hop, which at the time seemed to account, more or less, for all of hip hop. The hot argument would become who’s the Best MC Ever: Kane or Rakim?

So two versions here, the remix that appeared on Long Live the Kane and a remake with new lyrics and a guest spot by Kool G Rap, a Brooklyn fellow traveler whose snarling proto-gangsta style allowed him to totally pull off a lisp, taken from a mixtape by contemporary Boston b-boy Edan.

The backing is a slamming Marley Marl track built from James Brown (and family) samples — the industry standard of the time. Onto this sturdy structure, Kane spills a bountiful love note to himself.

I’ve been marveling at the masterful interplay of sound, meaning and delivery. It’s not that they hadn’t invented choruses by then, it’s just that when you can turn a cutting, clever phrase every bar, there be the hooks. He dives into ego and comes up inspiring smiles, tripping from one allusive simile to the next, restlessly changing up the cadence of his flow again and again.

These aren’t, mind you, unique to BDK, it’s just that he set the high-water mark: precision of science, grace of art, but doesn’t forget that MC means “master of ceremonies,” which means there’s a party going on right here.

Long Live the Kane at Newbury Comics.
Fast Rap at UndergroundHipHop.com.