Ramblings on Ghostface Killah's Career

My first Ghost album was The Pretty Toney Album not gonna front. I was 17 and just really discovering hip-hop beyond a casual listener to like, Jay-Z and DMX (Late 90's Top 40...) in junior high. He blew me away with not just crazy AF lyrics that made no sense and made all the sense in the world at the same time, but he was just dripping charisma everywhere. There was like puddles of that shit wherever he walked. And it smelled like fresh custom-painted Clarks, Egyptian Musk cologne, and weed. And looked like if Jean-Luc Basquait was as tough AF thug from the Stapleton Projects and followed Allah, well, religiously. It was love at first sight. No, I was none of the things I just described so affectionately. I was a suburbia-raised white kid from the Bay Area who went to a private school. But soon, I would be out in the world on my own. And I had just discovered weed and good hip-hop at the same exact time, it was like the big bag theory of my personal personality's creation. That was the combo that set it all off. And the Wu-Tang Clan, especially Ghostface Killah, were there from the beginning. I started with Pretty Toney, then graduated to Ironman, and finally Supreme Clientle. Those are considered the "eternal top two" of most Ghostface Killah fans' lists. Well, I would assume anyway that it is. Not like I did the proper data-gathering and research to come to such a conclusion. But those early GhostDini albums - 'Ironman' coming during the 1st phase of Wu-Tang's hip-hop dominance in the early-to-mid 90's and 'Supreme Clientele' coming during the 2nd half/phase of Wu's hip-hop dominance - were timeless classics, it's eternally agreed upon. From there, the debate amongst Ghostface Killah (GFK, for short) hardcore fanatics begins. 'Bulletproof Wallets' is, imo, underrated and a top 5 Ghost album. 'Fish scale' lead Ghost's "second half" career burst of popularity, his "second coming" with new fans from all over the world, discovering Ghost not from jump or even a few years after, but towards the half-way point in his career. When the Wu-Tang was beginning to be an after-thought musically and more popular as an Etsy logo plastered on everything from couches, to welcome mats, and even underwear. 'Twelve Reasons To Die', both the 1st and 2nd albums, are his latest projects. Ghost collaborated with newly arthouse in-crowd'd music producer Adrian Younge, on the first album. It went over so well that he & Younge went back in the studio and cooked-up a second album which was equally good (even though the first is ALWAYS better...always). Then there's 'Big Doe Rehab', 'Ghostdini Wizard in the Land of Poetry', his recent EP with BadBadGoodGood or whatever. I'm stoned and don't wanna fact-check so bite me if I'm incorrect. I'm now 3- years-old, listening to Ghost more than a decade after I discovered him. And he still sounds fresh and amazing AF. Ghostface Killah is truly one of the greatest emcees ever, for many reasons. First, as I've brought up before, his album discography is, well, bulletproof. There's not a bomb in the bunch. And there's a LOT of albums. That's #2 - his quality albums-to-number-of-albums-created ratio. It's 12-for-12 solo albums and 5-for-5 collabo albums (yes, I looked THAT Ghostface fact up on Wikipedia, whatever). So, just for shits, i AM going to list my favorite GhostFace albums, from best to least (but ALL are dope). It goes as follows (and open to change anytime from now to infinity, word to Souls of Mischief): 1. Only Built For Cuban Linx (hey, it's pretty much a collab album and the best of BOTH emcee's catalogs, for real g, straight-up) 2. The Pretty Toney Album (You always remember your first time...) 3. Iron-Man 4. Supreme Clientle 5. Bulletproof Wallets 6. Fischscale 7. Twelve Reasons to Die / SourSoul w/ BadBadNotGood (TIE) 8. 36 Seasons 9. Apollo Kids 10. Twelve Reasons To Die 2 11. Ghostdini: Wizard of Poetry in Emerald City 12. The Big Doe Rehab 13. More Fish 14. Wu-Massacre / Wu-Block (TBH I havn't listened to these joints yet and I heard they weren't that good so I GUESS if you wanna count thee as bombs then Ghost HAS dropped some shit that stinks...whatever I don't count collabs there's too many additional creative variables involved)