Self-Titled Album Track #8: Kicrox

(For more on Self-Titled Album, check the first post.)

Most albums have a track that addresses a conflict.  Most hip-hop albums refer to conflicts with other artists.  These are usually “diss tracks”.  Dis is dat track on Self-Titled Album.  “Kicrox” is exactly what it sounds like: 1SKILLZ is telling a certain rapper (and quite possibly his fans) to go and “kick rocks”.  And just think, it only took one track to totally dismantle any unity created by “The Rhythm”.

8. Kicrox

This was intended to be the “hardest” track on the album. Soulja Boy was my motivation the whole time I wrote this battle rap (RE: I like Soulja Boy about as much as GZA, Snoop Dogg [well, used to], and Ice-T). The track samples “Vanilla Dome” from Super Mario World.

This isn't about Soulja Boy, but it is clear that Soulja Boy can't contend with 1SKILLZ

1SKILLZ loves to party, but lyricism counts for a lot in the book of hip-hop.  “Kicrox” is the stuff of nightmares, situated smack in the middle of the album just so that it is impossible to avoid.  When LL Cool J released Bigger and Deffer in 1987, he preceded his “soft” track “I Need Love” with a bone-rattling volley entitled “The Breakthrough”.  “The Breakthrough” was hard as hell.  But “I Need Love” was a polarizing departure from this style, one that gave hip-hop purists a reason to dismiss him.

It's hard to be hard as hell all the time!

This track reverses the trend.  Perhaps more accurately, “Kicrox” adds to the unevenness of Self-Titled Album.  But even with that acknowledgment, this track is the most direct on the record; it takes no prisoners and needs no hook. It probably shouldn’t even have that “vanilla” instrumental in the background.

But as far as vanilla goes, the Vanilla Dome is as hard as it gets.

-1SKILLZ