Tame One

by Cyril Cordor
A fervent supporter of graffiti art and a graf writer himself, Tame One broke into rap music with the New Jersey rap group the Artifacts in the early '90s. He and El Da Sensei were enthusiastically praised for their graffiti-honoring debut, "Wrong Side of da Tracks," and following album, Between a Rock and a Hard Place (1994). After the two broke up in the late '90s, Tame One went several years without making any substantial material. He did work with his Boom Skwad crew and independently released a few 12" singles. In late 2001, he aligned himself with former Rawkus Records signees the High & Mighty, joining their newly formed Eastern Conference Records. Since then, the New Jersey rapper has maintained an ambitious profile in New York's independent rap scene, collaborating with other Eastern Conference artists as well as the Definitive Jux camp. He joined the underground supergroup the Weathermen formed in 2002 by Cage and El-P, and early the following year, he released his first solo album and EC debut, When Rappers Attack, which featured beats from reputable underground producers DJ Mighty Mi, Rjd2, and J-Zone. Still thriving from his new underground exposure, he released Waterworld (2004), a combined effort with labelmate Cage as the deranged Leak Bros., and second solo album, O.G. Bobby Johnson (2005) (a reference to the 1992 movie South Central). The latter album had him working solely with New Jersey producers and friends the Boom Skwad and the Dusted Dons. With this release, he fulfilled his two-album contract with EC and moved over to Blazin' for his 2006 Spazmatic LP. The eager MC wound up delivering another effort the same year called Slow Suicide Stimulus, a cooperative project with the Dusted Dons.