Dove Shack

Protégés of G-Funk maestro Warren G, Long Beach crew the Dove Shack never really blew up nationally, but to this day Westside aficionados still rock their debut album. Set against smooth keys, deep bass bumps, and ride-ready beats, C Knight, 2 Scoops and Bo Roc sound off about everyday life in the L.B.C., flexing mellow, sing-songy flows and grimy gangsta tales alike.

Lazing around in Warren G's groove without making a pass at his tragic sense of life, these arrogant hangers-on would be yawns if they weren't the ugliest sexists to make a three week splash all year. Although the hatred is everywhere, it's most painful on an early "skit"-song-"skit" triptych: "The Train" (a backslapper about gang rape in the dark),"F*ck Ya Mouth" ("To all our hookers and hoes"), and "Slap a Hoe" (a device invented for punks too yellow to do the job themselves). Heaven forfend the rappers actually doing any of these things, except maybe buy a Slap-a-Hoe--this isn't advocacy, it's constitutionally protected representation, harrumph. What I don't understand is why anyone who doesn't hate women is outraged when C. Delores Tucker goes just as far overboard in response. If they understand when self-serving black men express themselves in these, harrumph, metaphors, why don't they understand when self-serving black women counterattack by any means necessary? (Grade - C+)