Exit Wounds: The Album

Exit Wounds: The Album

There's no shortage of anger on <I>Exit Wounds</I>. Even when the backdrop suggests a lazy dance-out, the war of the words comes screeching forth. Outsiderz 4 Life lay down a placid rhythm track and then expletives fly. Lady Luck featuring Redman quote the Beastie Boys' "Hey Ladies" and turn it on its head with a 150-mile-per-hour rap. The album's real star, however, is obviously Yonkers-bred DMX, who leads off the album with an attack on Bill Withers's "Ain't No Sunshine" with expected ferocity and is featured with Big Stan on the Casio-keyboard-stuttering drive of "Walk with Me." Previous DMX collaborators the Lox shade things ominously for the noir-ish "Bust Your Gun." Queensbridge housing project's finest Nas keeps it raw with the appropriately titled "Gangsta Tears." Only Playa, hidden deep in the middle--sandwiched between Mack 10 and the truly beat-spastic Drag On--offer a conciliatory track with the romantically tinged "Incense Burning." It's so out of place, the effect is comical. How did these smoothies sneak past these gangstas, huh? <I>--Rob O'Connor</I>