Motown Records (originally named Tamla Records) was founded by Barry Gordy in Detroit, Michigan in 1959. The Black owned label would introduce the world to legendary artists such as The Supremes, The Temptations, Four Tops, Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and Michael Jackson. In the sixties, Motown formulated its signature soul sound and throughout the decade would string together a slew of top ten hits (seventy-nine, to be exact). Due to its success, Motown would earn the nickname of Hitsville USA, establishing itself as arguably the most important Black music label of all-time. As the eighties rolled around and hip-hop became more prominent, Motown, who once exclusively focused on soul and R&B, started looking to get in on the growing musical genre. Rich Nice would become the first rapper signed to Motown.

Most of you might not know who Rich Nice is, but through the years, he’s carved out a pretty impressive resume behind the scenes in the entertainment world. He helped found and was once a part of the legendary production team, Trackmasters (you can hear his voice on interludes for Foxy Brown and LL Cool J), he’s been a record label A&R rep, radio host, deejay, produced television, and for a reasonable fee you can periodically catch him on SiriusXM’s Sway In The Morning, hosting the A&R Room segment where he and Sway play new music and let the listeners call in and share their opinion on the songs. But before all of that, the Virgin Islands born Bronx transplant would get his feet wet in the industry as a rapper, inking a deal with Motown records in the late eighties. He would release his debut and only album, Information To Raise A Nation in 1990 (side note: Jesse West’s debut, No Prisoners, which was also released on Motown, came out a few months prior to Information, but Rich Nice signed his deal first). Information would include ten tracks, all produced and mixed by the Grammy Award winning producer, Gordon Williams aka Commissioner Gordon and Rich Nice.

I bought a used vinyl copy of Information for a few bucks at a local record store around my way (that I’ll probably never go to again based on their terrible customer service), strictly out of curiosity. I’ve never listened to the album until now, but my gut instinct (which is pretty much based on the cheesy album cover) has me feeling a little apprehensive.

The Rhythm, The Feeling – Rich Nice starts the album off with a techno-beat, accompanied by dance-themed rhymes, which both sound godawful. Moving on…

Outstanding – Jeff Redd (who I’ll always remember for his single, “You Called & Told Me” from the Strictly Business Soundtrack) joins Rich for this loose remake of The Gap Band’s classic with the same name. Nice spews nauseating pick-up lines and corny cliches, while Redd desecrates the hollow ground Charlie Wilson laid with his vocals on the original. Commissioner Gordon’s cheesy instrumentation only makes matters worse.

It’s Time To Get Hype – Rich and Commissioner Gordon concoct this swiftly paced backdrop that our host uses to spew his best battle bars over. Rich doesn’t sound great by any stretch of the imagination, but delivers a serviceable performance, and I’m sure the B-Boy community appreciated this instrumental way back then.

So What You Gotta Man – Ladies, if a man leads off the conversation with the title of this song (followed by bullshit like “My love will make you understand”) he’s only trying to fuck you. Oh yeah, back to the song. It’s trash.

Desperado (The Mexican) – Rich Nice wraps up side one of Information (if you’re listening on vinyl) with more meager boasts of his lyrical supremacy with no substance to back it up (What the hell does “My rhymes are stuck in your head just like an echo” mean?). Mr. Williams matches Rich’s mediocrity with another mundane musical score. And am I the only one that found it humorously ironic that the song title’s surname is “The Mexican,” but there’s a reoccurring vocal snippet of a brother saying “The first African rhythms were made in Africa”? After a short moment of silence, a snippet of Rich asking Mr. Williams to make a few alterations to a track can be heard, adding absolutely nothing to the album.

Outlaw – Rich claimed to be a desperado on the previous record, and now he’s acting out the role of an outlaw: “Wanted by be the best of them, but it’s all right, ’cause I’m better than the rest of them.” Rich adapts a grimier vocal tone than normal, as if that would make the listener belief the “fugitive image” he’s trying to sell (by the way, what does “finding your heritage” have to do with being an outlaw?). What’s really criminal about this record is Rich and Commissioner Gordon’s blatant heist of the blueprint for the Fearless Four’s “Rockin’ It” instrumental.

Dead To The Knowledge – The low-budget dark and creepy synth chords made me think Rich was going to give us an early horrorcore record. Instead, our host uses it to awaken those with no knowledge of self as he “drops science on ‘em.” Rich’s elementary level woke points delivered with an embarrassingly bad cadence, accompanied by the atrocious instrumental, makes this arguably the worst conscious record of all-time.

Trouble Man – Commissioner Gordon loops up Grover Washington Jr.’s “Hydra” (which seems like I’ve been referencing a lot lately) for this one. For some reason Mr. Williams felt the need to ruin the beautifully bouncy bop with a hideous horn riff placed in between Rich’s verses that sounds as cringe-worthy as someone scraping a fork against a chalkboard. Rich plays it cool as Arthur Fonzarelli, doing his best Rakim impersonation, which was far from impressive.

Information To Raise A Nation – Over a dark danceable instrumental sprinkled with an annoying squealing noise, Rich gets back to “dropping science” as he pretty much covers the same territory that he touched on during “Dead To The Knowledge.” He also drops his only curses on the entire album when he flares up while addressing some of the issues that plague the inner city: “Fathers shootin’ smack/mothers smokin’ crack/making a living on her back/the government smiling ’cause they run the game/ a fuckin’ horror show, it’s a shame.” Even though his message feels a bit contrived, this record fairs much better than his previous conscious content outing.

Two Seconds From Disaster – The song title sounds like a title for a corny apocalyptic movie. Rich does briefly touch on Armageddon, but he also discusses natural disasters, the crack epidemic, racism, AIDS, and a few conspiracy theories. The instrumental was surprisingly decent, and Rich delivers his best rhymes of the evening.

In an effort to inspire and uplift the faith of the church in Corinth, Greece, Apostle Paul wrote two letters to them (which are both books in the Bible: 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians). In chapter 9 of 1 Corinthians, Paul talks to the church about how he became a slave to everyone with the intention of converting as many as he could to Christianity. He speaks of becoming a Jew to win overs Jews, putting himself under the law to win over those under the law, living like one without law to win over those who live by no law, and becoming weak to appeal to the weak. He sums it all up by saying: “I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some.” Rich Nice is not an apostle, nor was he trying to win souls for Jesus (though, he does shoutout the Ancient Greeks on “It’s Time To Get Hype”). But like Paul, Rich was trying to be all things to all people on Information To Raise A Nation.

On Information, Rich Nice tries to wear four different hats: ladies’ man, lyrical hyena, party guy, and conscious rapper. Unfortunately, his limited talent doesn’t allow him to wear any of the hats well, and during his attempt to be all things to all people, he spreads himself thin and comes off like an amateur Jack of all trades, but master of none. To make matters worse, most of the production on Information is dated and downright awful and time has only made the music sounds painfully more bitter.

Information is proof that sometimes you can correctly judge a book by its cover. It’s also a cautionary tale of how an attempt to please everybody can lead to you disappointing everyone. Information just might be the worst hip-hop album of all time.

-Deedub

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