GZA's 1995 debut, Liquid Swords, is arguably Wu-Tang's finest hour; the lyrical force GZA unleashed on that album sucked the listener through a black hole beneath the subways of NYC into a grimy hip-hop Twilight Zone inhabited by Shaolin monks, microphone magicians, and linguistic architects. While GZA was busy creating mystical spheres with his rhymes, RZA laid down his most stark, violent production to date, and the collision of these two elements laid the hip-hop world on its back, feeling like we'd been camp-fucked by a gang of freestyle samurais. Although the power of that record was enough to damper the lukewarm reception of his hit-or-miss follow-up, Beneath the Surface (think of it as his Jackie Brown), heads had few doubts that GZA was one of the most creative MCs in the game.

On Legend of the Liquid Swords, RZA's warped, claustrophobic production is supplemented with a more rounded, organic sound, not unlike Jay's original Blueprint. And while GZA still builds seedy narratives with slang spills and a crunchy flow, he too seems to have peered out of hip-hop's esoteric dungeon for a clarifying breath of fresh air. The result is a record less mysterious and mercurial, a more personal and direct statement. GZA-- now well into his mid-30s and the oldest member of the Wu Clan-- seems more intent on explaining the Wu mythology than he once was in creating it; this mindset is evident on the record cover, on which he hunches over his 11 year-old son, deeply immersed in the large Wu tome. The kid even appears on the album's first track, a brief intro to "Auto Bio."

In the first verse of "Auto Bio", GZA recreates the early days of the Wu, where he and cousin RZA traveled from Staten Island (aka The Shaolin Land) to the Bronx, and witnessed the birth of hip-hop. Family and Wu loyalty are still central in GZA's thematic palette, and although RZA only produces one track (the pimp-strut-inspiring "Rough Cuts"), he lends his illustrious vocal styling to the excellent "Fam (Members Only)", declaring, "If you think you can fuck with the Wu Clan, get ya nose swollen' up like Toucan [pause] Sam, and we don't give a damn." Elsewhere, the always-sublime Ghostface drops by for "Silent", and Inspectah Deck trades licks with GZA on "Sparring Minds". Clearly, GZA has not betrayed his Wu allegiance, and the tight-nit, us-vs-them vibe adds a romantic immediacy to Legend of the Liquid Swords.

GZA still has a passion for wordplay. He twists his line breaks, inserts internal rhymes, pops off harrowing imagery, and displays more control of language than an entire army of cloned John Ashberrys. On the brilliant "Animal Kingdom", he engages in a bit of anthropomorphism, drawing parallels between the laws of the jungle and the code of the streets. The beat is sweaty and slow, as GZA creates an overgrown ghetto where a rat squeals, a zebra "comorflouges his bets", and "the scorpion sets up a sting for sly foxes". He also reprises Grandmaster Flash's classic line, "It's like a jungle sometimes," and though it's easily the most predictable move on the album, it also works.

The previously circulated "Fame" is in much the same vein as "Animal Kingdom", as GZA distorts celebrities' names in order to further his narrative. "Dempsey Russeled him down, got his jaw wide/ In an instant, Brooke Shields him from the gunfire." And on "Fame", the English language is just GZA's bitch, yielding to his iron will.

Legend of the Liquid Swords may lack some of the furious brutality of its '95 progenitor, but that's due mainly to its adequate, rarely astounding production. GZA lyrical skills, however, have hardly diminished: if anything he's picked up steam and served us one of the best hip-hop albums in recent memory. In 2002, the game was still with the Wu.

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