Hip-Hop Time Capsule: The Best Of Retv 1992

Artists

Album Info

Release Date: 2004

Label: Music Video Distributors

A pivotal year for the hip-hop genre, 1992 saw some raw new talent emerge on the scene. Take a look back (via interviews and music videos) at the stellar talents of Das EFX, Cypress Hill and Black Sheep, and discover how well-established stars such as Public Enemy and KRS-One consolidated their leading positions in the hip-hop community.

I expected, at the least, that this DVD would be a "Behind The Music" style quick look at a famous year in hip hop. 1992 was a time when hip hop was so hot that you never knew what the next big record would sound like. Let's have a tribute to the times and an examination of what made them possible? No. This, very avoidable DVD, is just a collection of music videos, interviews, and live performances that try to detail 1992 in rap; however, even with that limited pretense, this collection fails. The DVD rips through videos of the day but, frustratingly, plays none in their entirety! C'mon, any disc with "Rebirth of Slick" should be a sure winner but this one plays only 2/3 of the song--criminal. Their choice of vids is also poor. Many of the monster hits of the times are absent. Suddenly, 1992 doesn't seem so special. Fama-Lee? UMCs? Paleez. Even Bran Nubian's great "All For One" dies when you see the group's sloppy, low energy video. If I were a younger guy wanting to check out an era with a big reputation I would wonder what the hype was all about. The interviews were also very poor and lacked incite. They either were tiring 1992 self-hype sessions or later interviews that made little reference to the era at hand. I know what you are thinking: Music videos are played out, let's see the live stuff. Well, the live clips are so poorly recorded that they have to be shown on a smaller screen. Sound quality? Well, let's just say that I thought that I knew all the words to "O.P.P." but, so garbled was the Naughty sound, I could not even join in for the chorus! I was thrilled when someone had the idea to honor such a golden time in music. Certainly 1992 hip hop deserves its place along side 1966 rock 'n roll. This DVD, though, will do little to further that theory. Pass on this rental unless you need reminding, as I did, what a killer song Black Sheep's "The Choise is Yours" was.

The first 40 minutes consists of 18 partial hip hop videos, 12 of which first dropped either as a single or on an album in 1991, a problem since this is supposed to be a "time capsule" of 1992. Don't expect to hear anything about the #1 selling hip hop album of 1992, Sir Mix-A-Lot's Mack Daddy, and don't expect to hear mention of Arrested Development's grammy-winning debut. You also won't see anything from Dr. Dre's The Chronic, Ice Cube's Predator, or even Beastie Boys' Check Your Head. Classic underground joints like Showbiz and A.G.'s Runaway Slave and Common Sense's Can I Borrow A Dollar? are nowhere to be seen. Nothing from The Pharcyde, either. The remaining 45 minutes consists of interviews with rappers and live performances. For some reason these interviews and live performances are almost always shown only in the upper-right quarter of the screen, the rest of the screen given over to a lame Pee-Wee's Playhouse-style graphic. It's still great to see A Tribe Called Quest, Main Source, UMC's, etc., but you could watch the full videos elsewhere online. The highlight for me came in the second half when CL covered Pete Rock's lines from For Pete's Sake; I don't know where else you could get that. But it ain't worth sitting through this thing.

More Pictures