Public Enemy

Chuck D hasn't lost his gift for making corporate slogans his own: On "Game Face," a song
from the soundtrack to Spike Lee's new film, He Got Game, Chuck intones that he's still
using "the mike to reach out and touch, instead of the phone." A reunion album of sorts
featuring Flav, Professor Griff, Terminator X and the Bomb Squad production crew (as well
as assorted guest stars), Game finds Chuck D focusing his wordplay on the compli... More >

Who better than the sports addict who wrote "Air Hoodlum" with no prompting from Spike Lee to comprehend and then control the soundtrack concept? Note, however, that for all the we're-back bluster and covertly sexist anti-r&b rhetoric, the closest it gets to the stressful speed of classic PE is on one of the seven (of 12) songs Shocklee-Shocklee-Sadler didn't produce, the Danny Saber-Jack Dangers closer "Go Cat Go." Instead you'll hear backup femmes, churchy chorales, skeleton beats, Wu strings, more guest rappers than advertised, and funk samples, although these are outnumbered by hooks appropriated subtly (in fact, brilliantly) from "James Bond Theme" and the Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again" and blatantly (also brilliantly) from Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth." On the latter, Steve Stills himself blubbers a climactic coda. Over-the-hill blowhards gotta stick together. (Grade: A)