So why is Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
Enter the Wu-Tang is my Reservoir Dogs. It’s my Hard Eight.
I’ll explain.
Both are debut movies by auteur directors (Tarantino and PTA) made on next to nothing, featuring gritty, claustrophobic stories that leave a permanent imprint on your pop culture DNA.
And also, importantly: they’re both breathtakingly entertaining.
Much like the Wu-Tang Clan, Tarantino and PTA would both go on to iconic careers while spawning a thousand imitators who couldn’t come close to the real thing.
I like to think of the obscene amount of stellar hip-hop that the Wu-Tang Clan itself would later produce – in addition to solo projects, collaborations, and countless permutations – as the Wu-Tang Connected Universe.
But it’s the raw, off-the-wall, and every inch riveting Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) that is the greatest hip-hop collective of all time’s origin myth.
So let’s get mythic on this thing: there may be more polished Wu-Tang scrolls, but there is nothing that sounds quite like the moment the door to the 36 Chambers swung open.
I’m pretty sure the first Wu-Tang track I ever heard was “Wu-Tang Clan Ain’t Nuthing ta F’Wit,” and I’d pay cash money to go back in time to see how low my jaw dropped open the first time it hit me in the face.
It remains Top 5 Wu-Tang for me to this day, and I still can’t get over how ferocious and yet sly it is at the same time.
This was RZA’s producing genius straight out of the gate: rough cut by design sounds and madcap samples dialed together under a precisely designed mythology involving kung fu, philosophy, and supreme confidence and street knowledge born from growing up in tough Staten Island neighborhoods.
The best part is that when you Enter the Wu-Tang and its 36 Chambers, none of this has to be explained to you. You just feel it. You live through this music in as much as one can live through art.
And isn’t that the best thing, when that happens?
I also immediately connected with how the lyrics are drenched with pop culture, which considerably softens the blows of some of the darker elements and adds some much-needed levity to the mix (also see: early Tarantino and PTA on both scores).
I be tossing and flossing my style is awesome
I’m causing more Family Feuds than Richard Dawson
And also, sidenote: I find the boldness of throwing one’s own rap collective name into the title of multiple tracks on a debut album to be both hilarious and awfully impressive.
There are “bigger name” tracks on Enter the Wu-Tang, but for my money a masterpiece lurks late on the track list: “7th Chamber – Part II.” But to take a step back, if you’re wondering if there’s a “7th Chamber – Part I,” the answer is “yes” except it’s just called “7th Chamber.” (And technically both are listed with “Wu Tang” and a colon in front of the song title.)
The latter is also exceptional, though I have to dock it ever so slightly because it begins with a solid minute and a half of spoken dialogue. Anyway, once we get into the track proper, it lays down an incredible sinister sounding jazz piano riff that sets an intense mood.
But it’s “7th Chamber – Part II,” a mini-epic at over six minutes, that’s raw hip-hop perfection. This track uses the model that Wu-Tang dominates like no other crew before or since: underground hip-hop verses traded across the collective’s unfairly talented all-world roster, who are all at the top of their games here: GZA, Method Man, Inspectah Deck, Ghostface Killah, RZA, and Ol’ Dirty Bastard.
And it’s not just that the crew are to a man obscenely talented, it’s that collectively their chemistry is palpable. For example, ODB’s lunatic unleashed vibes segue exquisitely to GZA’s precise, smooth flow.
“C.R.E.A.M. (Cash Rules Everything Around Me)” might be the most famous and enduring Wu-Tang Clan track of all, and indeed, it has over half a billion plays on Spotify as of this writing (several times more than the next most popular Wu-Tang track’s numbers).
And indeed, the pretty, atmospheric piano loop and velvety production gels with the gruff rap styles perfectly on this one, while C.R.E.A.M. itself as acronym concisely conveys an entire worldview.
The songwriting is stellar, a narrative and myth, the real and the fantasy playing against each other across every bar.
I grew up on the crime side, the New York Times side
Stayin’ alive was no jive
At second hands, moms bounced on old men
So then we moved to Shaolin land
RZA and the Clan were also exceptionally smart from the jump in setting up the crew for future solo fame. “Method Man” showcases the goofy/gruff stylings of the titular rapper, with the off-kilter yet weirdly fun production the perfect backdrop for the M.E.T.H.O.D. Man.
“Da Mystery of Chessboxin’” is the perfect opportunity to praise RZA for groundbreaking production, using an Asian stringed instrument of some kind in this case to create a dramatic, otherworldly effect that simply makes you think of Shaolin as Wu-Tang Clan has conjured it. And on “Bring Da Ruckus,” the album opener, a spooky atmosphere is laid down that sets up the rest of Enter the Wu-Tang.
“Protect Ya Neck,” another Wu-Tang catchphrase of sorts which slots into the mythology, has a wild propulsion and groove to it. By the time we get to Ghostface in front of the mic, things are percolating, as my man Clyde Frazier might say.
I give an order to my peeps across the water
To go and snatch up props all around the border
And get far like a shootin’ star
‘Cause who I are is livin’ the life of Pablo Escobar
Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) is the minimal, throw all the rules off the roof masterpiece that links together the entire Wu-Tang Connected Universe.
It’s #8 of the best 1,000 albums ever.
The saga continues.
Some stats & info about Wu-Tang Clan – Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Hip Hop, Rap, East Coast Rap, Underground Rap, Hardcore Rap
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – #27
- All Music’s rating – 5 out of 5 stars
- When was The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) released? 1993
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #8 out of 1,000
Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
And if you want beef, then bring the ruckus.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective review of what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.