Gangster For Life: Kool G Rap
Words by Michael A. Gonzales / Features, Music / March 13, 2012 / No Comments

“As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.”
- Goodfellas, 1990

In the 1980s, New York City went through the best and worst of times. While the hood was popping and rocking to the ever-growing hip-hop culture, toxic white clouds of crack hovered over those same communities. Neighborhoods such as Harlem, Bed-Stuy, South Bronx, East New York, Queensbridge and Washington Heights, to name a few, were on the verge of self-destruction.

While most MCs during that golden age of rap came from the same damaged urban areas suffering from Reganomics, crack fallout and a declining education system, there was not much poetic rawness in their observations. With the exception of Just Ice, Spoonie Gee, Schooly D., KRS-1 and, of course, Grandmaster Flash’s classic “The Message,” most lyricists were trying to be more about partying than being grimy.

Rapper Kool G. Rap was a product of hard times and fat dimes puffed in Philly blunts. Premiering on the scene during the latter part of the ‘80s, when American’s ghettos had become worse and the war on drugs was seen as a joke.

Coming up hard on the streets of Corona, Queens, which he once described as, “a little Harlem,” Kool G. Rap developed his prince of darkness persona by simply observing the stone cold players and the suckers being played. As a teenager, sporting dukey gold chains, Cazal glasses and British Walkers, he began hanging out uptown, across 110th Street, on the illmatic boulevards of the “real” Harlem.

Patronizing notorious bars and after-hours spots, G. Rap spent time with the neighborhood “scramblers,” as the gamblers, drug dealers and thieves called themselves. Without a doubt, these corrupt characters soon found their way into G. Rap’s nihilistic narratives. By the time Corona, Queens based rapper, whose government name is Nathaniel Wilson, came on the scene, hip-hop had been popping off in New York City for more than a decade. Although in retrospect, folks try to romanticize the times, saying, “Back in the day it was all love,” they are lying.

In fact, anybody who ever attended a summertime block party, one of Russell Simmons’ parties at the Hotel Diplomat or just a jam in some housing project recreation room, could tell you stories about stick-up kids, drugs deals and brutal thugs who just came to start trouble. However, it was within this wild world where Kool G. Rap was born, bred and, as a teenager, decided to document.

With his trademarked lisp and raspy voice, reciting rhymes about the day-to-day struggle of merely trying to survive be you a drug cowboy, dope fiend or scared spectator, there is no denying the power of Kool G. Rap’s hard knock narratives.

For the rest of this story, go to:

http://massappeal.com/2012/03/gangster-for-life-kool-g-rap/

what was his best album?