How come Slick Rick was never able to have another Great Adventures?

Mike the Executioner

Mike the Executioner

What went on up there? Poppers and weird sex!
Joined
Sep 10, 2015
Messages
9,880
Reputation
3,445
Daps
39,351
Reppin
Brooklyn, New York
"Hey Young World" popped into my head and it got me thinking about it. I know he went to jail around that time, but he always had the talent to put together another undisputed classic. Was it just him losing his confidence? Lack of inspiration, producers not giving him good beats, etc. I just feel like Great Adventures shouldn't be the only album he has with a legendary reputation.

@FreshAIG @DANJ! @JustCKing @mobbinfms @Piff Perkins
 
MurderToCassette

MurderToCassette

Sa Da Tay
Joined
Sep 9, 2015
Messages
3,962
Reputation
2,141
Daps
18,064
Reppin
I am comfortable and I love you
A lot of big 80's Mc's had a hard time following up their earlier material going into the 90's. The fact that Rick went to jail didn't help.Gonna go with a hot take and say I really like The Ruler's Back. The first six songs or so are really well produced and have some of his best story telling, plus you get the ill Large Professor remix of "It's A Boy". Behind Bars had a couple of joints I messed with but was extremely uneven, and Art of Storytelling was overall pretty good.
 
Last edited:
DANJ!

DANJ!

Superstar
Joined
May 8, 2012
Messages
8,409
Reputation
3,972
Daps
27,412
Reppin
Baltimore
Prison, pretty much.

I don't think he lost his talent, but it's probably a lot harder to have the focus and ability to make a great album when you're recording it on work release and have time constraints, and the reality that you're goin' right back to jail after you're done in the studio. I thnk that a free Slick Rick woulda still been partyin' and enjoying life, and he'd have had way more of "the Slick Rick vibe" on the follow up albums. But bein' locked up, I'm sure he lost a lot of that, and didn't even have much creative control over the third joint. You can even tell he doesn't sound like he was into it... and really, how could he be.

It's the equivalent of when a rapper dies and then the label does what they want with his music... Rick was alive and getting his vocals put on beats he didn't record the songs to... so that sums it up. His head probably wasn't in the game, and you can't manufacture a classic.

The fact that he got out and was able to pump out a decent album 10 years after his prime gives us an idea of how good he coulda been had he not gone to jail in '90.
 
get these nets

get these nets

Veteran
Joined
Jul 8, 2017
Messages
51,371
Reputation
13,903
Daps
194,529
Reppin
Above the fray.
Not just the time spent away, but prison traumatizes people. You're not the same person coming out who went in.
Dudes who were already goons can come out and it helps their creative process (and promotion) because their sentence becomes material to rap about.

For a dude who was into getting fly, and getting women..prison was a difficult adjustment and dulled his creativity.

Also, he was young and carefree when he did the first album. Coming home to adult problems and responsibilities also dulled the creative process.


The verse he dropped on the Montell Jordan record when he came home proved to me that he still had the Slick Rick swagger and talent

He said she crashed her jalopy into my Rolls..........only Rick would call a bucket/hooptie a jalopy
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top