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Four years since the L.A. group's first pro-pot anthem, "Stoned Is the Way of the Walk," Cypress Hill is still telling us they love to smoke ganja. How B-Real and Sen Dog waste their days is their business, but it makes you wonder: What's wrong with their personal lives that they need to be stoned all the time? And how can they be so enthusiastic about it? III (Temples of Boom) exhales the same clouded sentiments of past albums, but offers no answers. Herb is never far from the conversation on Cypress Hill records--how they smoke more than anyone, how they were rapping about it before anyone--but they never explain why, never suggest they derive something positive (or negative) from pot. Though III's "Illusions" begins with an Indian sitar, presumably a reference to '60s drug culture's Eastern influence, there's no expanded consciousness in the accompanying raps. Cypress Hill champion drug use, it seems, to bolster their outlaw image; they place pot smoke alongside beat-downs, just another illegal activity to prove they're bad dudes. --Roni Sarig
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Reviews:
A Masterpiece From The Dark Side
For me, this is the greatest hip-hop album of all time. Now, this probably has a lot to do with the fact that I am more of a "glass-half-empty" kind of guy, and you will not find a darker, more pessimistic, paranoid vision than the one expressed by B-Real (and to a lesser extent his sidekick Sen-Dog) on this disc. Even Muggs' production manages to convey darkness and fear throughout the proceedings. But as dark as it gets, the album never loses hold of the funk. So basically, it's a great disc to bug out to when you think the world is out to get you.
Kicking off with yet another great ode to "the powers of the herb," Temples of Boom ends up being almost a cautionary statement about what happens if you smoke too much weed ... I've read more than one leaflet stating that excessive use often leads to paranoia, and this album bears that claim out. Cypress Hill obviously love their herb, but there's little joy in the celebration; instead it comes across as a means of coping somehow with their dark world.
But is the world dark as a result of their chimney-esque smoke intake? When B-Real isn't rapping about how he's having "Illusions" f***in' me up in my mind", he's blowing people's heads off while singing "Boom Biddie Bye-Bye", engaging in a very nasty feud with Ice-Cube on "No Rest For The Wicked", extolling the benefits of getting jumped into a gang on "Throw Your Set In The Air", gunning down weed-dealing adversaries before they can shoot him first ("Stoned Raiders"), engaging in random armed robbery and fleeing the police ("Locotes"), just firing guns at seemingly anyone who happens to get in his way ("Make A Move"), or lamenting how he "can't even trust my own brothers" ("Killafornia").
The line that says it all about Cypress Hill and where their heads were at when they made this album:
"Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, I smoke weed and I got brain damage,
But I don't give a f***, cuz I still manage"
("Strictly Hip-Hop")
Muggs' backing tracks create a creepy feel that perfectly suits the schizophrenic, paranoid mindset that dominates the lyrics. He cooks up a batch of minor-key hooks and basslines with some very unusual samples, including opera singers' voices and spooky keyboards. Overall, the effect is mind-blowing.
No silly house-party jams on here, folks. This one's for throwing on later in the evening when darker feelings start to creep to the surface. Which has always been the time of night I most related to anyway.
A funny personal story - in 1995 I was a middle school math teacher, one of my students (knowing I liked some hip-hop) actually gave me this as a Christmas present. Talk about awkward, LOL. But it remains one the best presents I ever got; 14 years later and still love it.
Amazon should discard the "official" review
The amazon reviewer didn't mention the music; its more of an anti-pot attack than an album review, so ignore it.
Cypress Hill has created a finely crafted hip hop album with catchy beats and tight lyrics. These, along with the album art create a sinister mood that is a joy to take in. It is a remarkable piece of art.
If your taste in hip hop consists of Jesse McCartney and Usher then you might not like this album. But if you have even a slight appreciation of the dark side then you will be hugely entertained.
Cypress Hill's Darkest Album
This is my favorite Cypress Hill album, because it is totally consistent from beginning to end, and has a dark, spooky atmosphere, and some of the most violent, vicious rhymes B-Real has ever done.
By Far Cypress Hill at their peak
This album must have been played by me over 1,000 times since it was released. The "dark" production and extreme brilliance will never be matched. This is Cypress hill's best album (I have all of them so far). The vocal style, lyrics, excellent production for its time, by far exceeds anything out nowadays. Let's hope to see albums like this in the future, pure hip hop and without a doubt a gem in my collection.
No bong necessary
Let's get one thing out of the way right now. I don't smoke pot. I never have. I think it is a foolish choice. (As Daniel Tosh put it "grow up and do cocain like an adult.")
With that stated ... this is in my opinion, Cypress Hill's finest album. I don't know if it's possible to make a goth rap album (a what?!) but this is the closest I've ever seen. Yeah, it's dark ... but there's a jillion skillion dark albums out there in multiple genres. But this one is different. The album has an atmosphere to it that I've NEVER heard in hip-hop before or since. Though it has ZERO in common with Type O Negative ... somehow it reminds me of the atmosphere on Bloody Kisses.
On Production, Muggs always had a sound that was rather signature. But on this one he expands the pallette he paints with and still maintained his signiture. What resulted was a strange concoction of sound few in rap then would dare to use ... and probably NONE in the conformist cesspool of today's rap would even consider trying.
On one hand, every song on this album makes me imagine night. Dark night with the pavement still shining from a recent rain. Yet still the album doesn't feel flat, it travels all over the place with its eerie gloom and grim fog ... that gets punctuated here and there with sparse sounds that sound way too bright and cheerful to belong on this album. And it all works. It shouldn't. It does. If you opt to listen to the whole album from beginning to end you get the sense that you've been taken for a ride in the way that few albums do. Few albums really NEED to be heard as a WHOLE to be truly appreciated but this one does. Some day down the road I think this album will be recognized for what it is, but as yet it hasn't received the full credit as a masterpiece that it deserves.
