“This jam’s worth twice the gold in Fort Knox” – More T La Rock

Posted on by Robbie Ettelson

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The title track from T La Rock‘s first album was also one of it’s strongest. Many of the other songs had extended versions released as single’s with extra verses and edits (“Breakin’ Bells”, “Back To Burn” and “This Beat Kicks”), but “Lyrical King” never made it beyond LP status. For some reason, “Live Drummin’ With The Country Boy”, “Havin’ Fun” and “Three Minutes of Beat Box” were included on the album instead of some of his better b-sides. I guess we can blame Virgil Simms from Fresh/Sleeping Bag for that. “Havin’ Fun” and “Live Drumming…” are some of the few extended skits to be featured on an 80’s rap album (the only other one that comes to mind is JVC Force‘s equally unnecessary “Force Is Buggin'”), and contain the painful comedy stylings of T, “Japanese” Greg Nice and DJ Louie Lou performing poor imitations of Tony Montana and a hillbilly. Not only does the listener have to endure this obvious time waster, but they also included three minutes of Greg Nice making the music with his mouth, which is about two minutes longer than it needs to be.

But back to the track at hand – Mantronik delivers another heavy drum machine track for T to get loose on, as he reminds us that he’s repping for the Boogie Down. Despite being labeled as a “disco faggot” by Just-Ice after they parted ways following the recording of Back To The Old School (although they would later patch up their differences to work together again for the Girls & Guns LP), Mantronik boasted of having the most expansive and up-to-date studio of the time and has an extensive list of classic hip-hop beats under his belt. Sadly, he was lured by the ever increasing tempo’s and “complex” programming of dance music after a couple of increasingly smoothed-out Mantronix albums (following MC Tee abandoning rap for a career in the airforce).

T La Rock – Lyrical King [From The Boogie Down Bronx] (Lyrical King, Fresh, 1987)

19 thoughts on ““This jam’s worth twice the gold in Fort Knox” – More T La Rock”

  1. Mantronix has some really techno 12″s out there, but they’re early production is so raw, it’s bizarre.

  2. Thx for another T La Rock track. I really miss the old school hip hop, but what is happing at the end of that track ?!?!

    I always thought that the actual name “Matronix” was the best idea througtout his carrier. It sound so cool!!

  3. “what is happing at the end of that track ?”

    Do you mean the scream and the English guy saying “Keep on dancing”? Your guess is as good as mine.

  5. I always loved “bust these lyrics” on this record!

  6. T La Rock is back to burn!

    After all these years this great album is finally released on CD. But what I can’t believe is that they’ve included the 10 minutes of torture called ‘Live Drummin’ With The Country Boy’ and left out ‘Nitro’ and ‘Scratch Monopoly’. I’ve never heard ‘T La Rock Rockin The Party’, so I don’t know if that should’ve been on the CD. Can I find the .mp3 on this site too?

    Lotuz

  7. “Live Drummin” instead of “Nitro” and “Scratch Monopoly”? That’s pure foolishness.

    I’ll post “T La Rock Rockin The Party” and “Scratch Monopoly” later this week.

  8. I saw someone had treacherous three and T La rock Live and grandmaster vs T La Rock battle on soulseek.

  14. Damn shame, did Flash produce this too?

    Talk about Sophmore Jinx

  15. yeah I got my copy of “The Lyrical King” today too

    I been waiting over 10 years for this to get on CD

  16. Todd Terry did the majority of the production. I knew ‘On A Warpath’ wasn’t as good as ‘Lyrical King’, but I didn’t expect this. Most of the beats I don’t feel and I doubt T La Rock did at the time, because he sounds uninspired on most tracks.

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