Good stuff and that piece Fuchs wrote for Fat Lace was excellent
Fuchs shafted a lot of his artists but genuinely seemed to have love for Spoonie and 45 King
Spoonie Gee threads don't come along all that often so excuse me while i take advantage.
This dude is as important and as dope as Rakim or 'G Rap to me
he just has the character and effortless flow that technically more gifted rappers just don't have
and is one of the most underrated storytellers in the rap game.
What's dopest about him, though, is that he made great records throughout all the earliest years of recorded hip hop through to the golden age and even blessed some more smoothed out Teddy Riley beats in the twlight of his career
Melle Mel couldn't manage that
nor Moe Dee (be honest - his solo stuff is mostly garbage)
and Grandmaster Caz, Coldcrush and solo, barely has 5 great songs to his name
yet Spoonie doesn't get afforded the props these guys do.
Disco-band era.
He did his thing with the best record of '79 "spoonin' rap"
then came with, arguably, my favorite rap 12" of all time "love rap"/"new rap language"
and then bounced to Sugarhill and made the classic battle of the sexes "monster jam" and the hard, and lyrically deep in places, "spoonie is back" also takin' in time to write "survival the message 2)" for Melle Mel to getout of his contract.
Post-electro era.
As typified by "beat street" by Melle Mel
his first big comeback "the big beat" set it off, "get off my tip" remains slept on and my favorite cut from his early days at Tuff City, the Davy DMX produced "street girl"
where he stook to his guns with a story about a less-than-trustable woman over an almost poppy electro beat at a time when "it's yours" and "i need a beat" where the biggest records in NYC after Run Dmc had changed the game and inspired a new generation of rappers with their more hardcore shoutin'/808 drum machine steez
808 drum machine era.
Naturally, Spoonie didn't wanna get left behind and had to get in on this too and hooked up with Marley for the tuff "it's my style"/"serve you right"/"take it off" 12", the former a dis to Schoolly D who he felt was biting his name and persona.
Sampling era.
Marley hook-up # 2
this for for the classic "the godfather" (good to see that in GTA : San Andreas) and the equally as dope but less known "spoonie gee" (used the "what's the 411" loop 4 or 5 years before "what's the 411"), "she's my girl" and "mighty mike tyson"
then there was his final Tuff City 12" "you're not just a fool.."/"this is the place to be" (the b. side is insanely slept on)
and, as i stated before, as newjack-swing was sweeping the charts and Heavy D was getting big Spoonie tried his hand as some Teddy Riley produced love-jams which were probably the best beats Riley did for a rapper
excluding the much earlier "the show" and "monster beat", obviously.
Sadly, he's still locked up at the moment
but check the interview Jayquan did with him from the belly a few months back :
http://jayquan.com/spoonint.htm
I think his man Troy L. Smith is trying to get a part 2 soon to discuss the scene uptown and downtown , groupies and the shadier aspects of the game Spoonie was involved in.
