The 3rd World
Viper Records (2008)

by Kin One

This album is for the hood—it’s that real rap that’s always missing at commercial radio stations. The Harlem MC continues to drop revolutionary bullets on the game—after all, what else can we expect from Immortal Technique? And the sounds are his best production yet, with help primarily from DJ Green Lantern, whose prints are heavy all over the album. “Golpe del Estado,” produced by Southpaw, is the best beat on the album, though, in my opinion.
Despite the fact that all the joints on this record are fresh, it is a mix tape, which means that it’s pretty much mixed with certain lines rewound and played back again. It can be annoying at times, but it's pretty minimal by mix tape standards and doesn't lessen much of the overall production.
Message-wise, tracks like “Third World” bring the painful truth to light: “I’m from where people pray to the gods of their conquerors / and practically every president’s a money launderer. / I'm from where the only place democracy’s acceptable / is if America’s candidate is electable. / And they might even have a black president, but he’s useless, / ‘cause he does not control the economy, stupid. / Lock and load your gun, where I’m from, the Third World, son. / Been to many places, but I’m Third World born. / Guerrillas hit and run where I'm from, the Third World, son. / You polluted everything, and now the Third World’s gone. / The water’s poisoned where I'm from, the Third World, son. / Seven hundred children die by the end of this song...”
And, in “Harlem Renaissance,” Technique, from Harlem himself, compares and finds the similarities in the struggles of impoverished communities worldwide. In one verse, he drops truth to power with something that goes a little like this here: “When I speak about Harlem, I speak to the world, / the little Afghan boy and the Bosnian girl, / the African of Sudan, the people of Kurdistan, / the Third World American, indigenous man, / Palestinians, Washington Heights Dominicans, / displaced New Orleans citizens, / beach front Brazilian favelas that you living in. / The hood is prime real estate, they want back in again. / I didn’t write this to talk shit, I say it because / some of ya’ll forgot what the Harlem Renaissance was. / We had revolution, music, and artisans, / but the movement was still fucked up like Parkinson’s, / ‘cause while we were giving birth to the culture we love, / prejudice kept the old people outta the club, / only colored celebrities in the party, / and left us a legacy of false superiority. / WEB Dubois versus Marcus Garvey, / and we ended up selling out to everybody. / The Dutch Schultzes and the John Gottis, / banksters, modern day gangsters, a mobile army. / They wanna move us all out the NYC, / like the did to the Jews with the Alhambra Decree. / So support your own businesses and do the knowledge, / ‘cause the real Harlem Renaissance is economic…”
The 3rd World, to summarize, won’t disappoint. The beats and punchlines are dope and Immortal Technique’s flow is like no other MC’s in the game right now. And don’t worry, people. Technique’s much-anticipated new album, The Middle Passage, is still on schedule and is, so I’ve heard, almost complete. In the meantime, though, The 3rd World should curb your appetite.

*****
Kin One is a local dj/programmer for 91.5fm Radio Bilingue’s “Optimus Rhyme Show” and a member of the Universal Zulu Nation All Tribes. He can be reached at kin1inca@yahoo.com.