Boogie Down Productions

The second album from BDP, this 1988 release is an unfrontable classic. Although his partner Scott La Rock had recently been killed, KRS comes hard, delivering an ill collection of timeless hip-hop standards. Includes "My Philosophy," "Jimmy," "Stop The Violence," "Illegal Business," and more.

Rap music is a primary means by which the experience of young blacks in America is being
communicated to the mainstream – read "white" – culture. In that regard, By All Means
Necessary, the new album by the South Bronx-based Boogie Down Productions (BDP), is a
gripping statement. "I'm trying not to escape," says twenty-two-year-old rapper KRS-ONE on
the album, "but hit the problem head on/By bringing out the truth in a song." Ove... More >

Deprived of the great murdered beatmaster Scott LaRock, KRS-One is reduced to a stark minimalism that matches his mood: still brandishing his piece on the cover, he's as serious as Jesse inside, occasionally pretentious but never full of himself. He criticizes the self-proclaimed kings of a scene too democratic to support royalty and the self-proclaimed godfathers of a scene too young to have an old school, identifies tribalism as the white man's game, and comes out strong for peace through strength. Only "Jimmy" is much fun, and "Jimmy" is a condom commercial. But at his best--"Stop the Violence," which might conceivably catch black radio in a community-spirited moment of weakness--he's as complex and cold-eyed as the kings themselves, with two extras: he's not middle-class and he's on a mission. (Grade - B+)