A tender ballad centered around a bright-but-dusty piano sample, Marciano attacks the subject of dealing cocaine by envisioning it as an interracial relationship. The whole drug-as-woman metaphor has been around forever, which makes "Jungle Fever" all the more impressive. The blaxploitation groove on "Whateva Whateva" serves as the perfect backdrop for Marciano's gifted wordplay and dark comedy, where Marciano threatens to "pop the air out of your balloon and the spare, too." None of the music on Marcberg rises above a dull roar, but that makes it that much scarier here, you have no idea when someone is going to jump out of the corner and shoot you.Įven when Marciano tips toward cliché, he finds a way to make it work. Along with the eerily visceral thump of "Pop", he keeps his eye on the kids on roller skates, hoping none of them get hit with a stray bullet during an impending gunfight. Much of that is due to Marciano's hyper-syllabic and percussive flow, narrative flair, and fastidious eye for detail as both a rapper and producer.
The key to the record's appeal is that while it clearly pays homage to a bygone hip-hop era, it never sounds dated or overtly reverent. II from kindred spirit Raekwon, mainly because it sounds like it was released in 1992. Marciano still refers to police officers as "jakes," Naughty by Nature and Earl Boykins(!), as well as London Fog(!!) are all referenced. The beats are minor-key, sample-based boom-bap, as if Swizz Beats, shiny suits, and rappers in skinny jeans never happened. Marcberg could be heard as revivalism in the vein of Only Built 4 Cuban Linx.Pt.
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