Revolutions [PA]

Performer: The X-ecutioners
Artist: Blue Man Group; Ghostface Killah; Black Thought; Cypress Hill; Rob Zombie; Dead Prez; Trife; Anikke; Saigon; Scram Jones; Start Trouble; Sly Boogie; Rock Marcy; Josey Scott; Slug; Fat Joe; Aasim
Producer: Rob Swift; Anthony Saffery
Distributor: Sony Music Distribution (

Notes: The X-ecutioners: Rob Swift , Roc Raida, Total Eclipse (rap vocals). Additional personnel: Cypress Hill, Dead Prez, Fat Joe, Ghostface Killah, Aasim, Nikki , Rob Zombie, Slug, Trife, Roc Marse, Black Thought, Blue Man Group. The X-Ecutioners dropped one of their best tracks on a Playstation 2 video game soundtrack, 2003's SSX 3. A lively, robotic number that showed the DJs were really thinking out of the box, "Like This" returns on the group's 2004 full-length Revolutions, and it's got some worthy company. Rapping at full force, Ghostface's appearance on "Live from the PJs" makes for the other instant highlight. Roots man Black Thought goes round for round with Ghostface, and the rickety looping of 7th Wonder's "Daisy Lady" seals the deal. Lyrically nailing it on "Back to Back," Saigon and Scram Jones are the unknown finds of the album. The B Real, Dead Prez, and Fat Joe tracks are all true hip-hop and very welcome. The more pop-oriented bits of the album -- a redo of "More Human Than Human" with Rob Zombie and Slug, "Let Me Rock" with punk-rapper Start Trouble -- don't fare as well, but they're flashy fun and good for a listen or two. The skits are hilarious (the one about bootlegging The Best of Lillo Thomas especially) and the scratching is tight, often acting as a funky, "wacka-wacka" guitar or just plain sounding like madness. As producers the boys have come far and the album is paced well, winding down with some smoky, deep numbers. The just fair pop tracks keep it from being classic, but this is the best the talented team has sounded on record yet. ~ David Jeffries In hip-hop's nascent period, DJs from Grandmaster Flash to Jam Master Jay were given the praise and respect they deserved as the driving force behind the music. As rap exploded in the 1990s, the MC became more and more of the focal point, with the DJ fading into the backdrop. However, in the underground, a revolution was brewing, instigated by talented quick-draw turntablists, and at the forefront was the formidable and aptly named cutting crew the X-Ecutioners. As one of the first scratch units to secure a record deal, they slowly ascended to greater heights in the hip-hop world. The group's fourth record, REVOLUTIONS, featuring scads of top-shelf MCs driven to the absolute limits of their game, exhibits the X-Ecutioners as masters of their art, with track after beat-driven track whipping old-school rap, rock, and deep funk into a sonic frenzy. While Rob Zombie's appearance on a reinvention of "More Human Than Human" may get the most attention, a toe-to-toe battle between titans Black Thought (of the Roots) and Ghostface on "Live from the PJs" should turn even more ears. REVOLUTIONS, with its apt dual-meaning title, spins on a level all its own and continues the X-Ecutioners' mission to further push the boundaries of hip-hop.

Spin (p.110) - "[T]he remix of White Zombie's 'More Human Than Human' brings the real noise." - Grade: B+ Entertainment Weekly (pp.122-3) - "[T]he three DJs' constant, skittering flourishes maintain an engaging, unpredictable energy..." -- Grade: B CMJ (p.8) - "REVOLUTIONS is surely the only record to boast both Ghostface Killah and Blue Man Group - and more rock riffs and guest spots than a Santana record..."

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