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Method Man: The Tical (Def Jam); Redman: Dare Is a Darkside (Def Jam)

Michael A. Gonzales, Vibe, November 1994

WHAT IS reality in hip hop? Flicking a 50-cent lighter during an old-school concert while the ancient-as-angel-dust Sugarhill Gang chant that "Hotel, motel, Holiday Inn" shit? Back in those days, the late '70s and early '80s, when Afrika Bambaataa was trooping through the South Bronx looking for the perfect beat and Melle Mel's gritty voice exploded in the gray sky, who could imagine that social ills would only intensify and mold hip hop into something else so soon?

Total word count of piece: 718

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