14 Shots to the Dome (1993)

It’s easy to forget the fact that the Mama Said Knock You Out cycle was actually a slow burn. It took a third single, “Around the Way Girl,” to secure the album’s first major pop hit by March 1991, and that was about four months after the single’s release. The title track would join it by the middle of the year. The album itself had the lowest peak on the Billboard 200 chart of any LL Cool J album since Radio. It needed four months to be certified Platinum, twice the amount of time it took for the oft-maligned Walking With a Panther. And it wasn’t until January 1992, almost two years after its release, when LL Cool J received a double Platinum award. He only needed six months for Bigger and Deffer.

But the slow burn became advantageous to LL’s comeback mission, especially for the most prestigious award ceremony in the music showbiz. Because Mama Said Knock You Out came out in September 1990, it missed the eligibility window for the 33^rd Annual Grammy Awards, which were held on February 20th, 1991. That meant that LL Cool J and Def Jam had the whole of 1991 to really imprint the album and its associated singles in the public consciousness. Plus, it was probably best to evade M.C. Hammer, who really had an awesome year with 1990. By the time the next Grammy award ceremony took place on February 25^th, 1992, Mama Said Knock You Out was already double Platinum, with “Around the Way Girl” certified Gold, and some stellar reviews. Commercially and critically, no rapper had it better in 1991 than LL Cool J, and the Recording Academy made it official by awarding him a Grammy—his first—for Best Rap Solo Performance, thanks to that classic title track.

LL Cool J was back on top, but in a different way. By the early ‘90s, he was no longer the undisputed alpha in a now-much larger and increasingly competitive scene. However, he was the only one from the early-to-mid-‘80s who was still relevant in the ‘90s, thereby pointing to the possibilities of longevity in a young genre that was constantly evolving.

But LL was still trying to figure out his career path. The singles he released in the latter half of 1991—”Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?” and “Strictly Business,” both for movie soundtracks—indicated a more polished, New Jack Swing-leaning approach, and he began his first serious venture into Hollywood. But those singles failed to catch fire, and it was evident that James Todd Smith perhaps needed a lot more time behind the screen to get to the level of that other Mr. Smith.

Meanwhile, the rap world was changing—again. And an interview with Yo! MTV Raps in 1992 hinted at what LL’s next album, his fifth one, was going to sound like.

“On my next album, I’ma blow up,” he said to Yo! MTV Raps co-host Doctor Dre. “You know why I’ma blow up? ‘Cause I’m not coming with that pop mess, man. I’m sick of that pop!”

As far back as the early ‘80s, there were rappers who delivered their lyrics in an aggressive or confrontational tone backed by speaker-rattling beats. As a result, Run-DMC is sometimes cited as the first hardcore rap act. But then others took it further. Schoolly D, Ice-T, and N.W.A. attracted attention for not just the way they rapped, but what they rapped about. Drug dealing, gang warfare, prostitution, and police brutality were some of the common themes. Ice-T preferred to call this style “reality rap.” The media went for another term: gangsta rap.

By the early 1990s, it was clear that this strain was now the dominant force in hip hop. And that sentiment was enforced by the enormous success of Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, which dropped in December 1992. It was now about being rough, rugged, and raw. And if LL Cool J had any chance of thriving in this climate, he had to come correct. 14 Shots to the Dome, an allusion to every song in the album being a potential hit, was his bold answer.

14 Shots to the Dome was released on March 30th, 1993, with “How I’m Comin’” as the album’s first single, as well as its first track. And back then, the lyrics that fans heard were rather uncharacteristic of Uncle L: “Stick the steel in your mouth / *Buck, buck, buck, buck, buck*! Lights out!”

The very next number, “Buckin’ ‘Em Down” is as self-explanatory as one can get: “Buck, buckin’ ‘em down! Buck, buckin’ ‘em down!”

What’s up with the gangsta posturing? There was a time when LL could be “hardcore” just by spitting one clever bar after the other. He didn’t need the gun talk at all! Now he sounded just like any other East Coast rapper hopping on the gangsta rap bandwagon.

And even some of the standard brag rap numbers sounded so ordinary. There’s nothing about “A Little Somethin’”, “Soul Survivor,” or “Ain’t No Stoppin’ This” that would require anyone to rewind and hear a lyric or two in amazement. In addition, the reggae-tinged “Diggy Down” is rather embarrassing, as LL wails from one line to the next about societal ills with little to no sense of cohesion. Whatever happened to that considerably convincing social commentator of Mama Said Knock You Out? To answer that question, he was obviously on vacation.

It isn’t a complete lyrical washout, though. Half the time, LL Cool J shows that he still has the chops. “Stand By Your Man” is a danceable R&B number in which LL espouses steadfastness in romantic relationships. He does some incredible tongue-twisting in “Straight from Queens.” He bares his soul as he narrates his entire career up to that point in “Funkadelic Relic.” He admirably makes an implicit statement about hip hop music being the strongest hope for the inner city in “All We Got Left Is the Beat.” Lords of the Underground join him in the high-energy “(NFA) No Frontin’ Allowed.” And LL proves why he is one of the unheralded punster greats in “Pink Cookies in a Plastic Bag Getting Crushed by Buildings” as he uses rappers’ names to construct his verses in his grand euphemism for sex.

But “Back Seat,” the B-side to “Pink Cookies…”, is by far the best thing on the album. Riding the same slow R&B groove that Monica would use for her hit “Don’t Take It Personal (Just One of Dem Days),” LL basically creates a tutorial about how to dirty-talk without uttering a single curse word or anything sexually explicit. It’s ingenious, it’s utterly impressive, and it’s a worthy precursor to the smash single that would follow two years later.

And production-wise, LL is still covered. Marley Marl is on board again, this time joined prominently by QDIII, the son of Quincy Jones, and yes, Bobcat, who had by now had work with 2Pac and former N.W.A. members on his resume. LL couldn’t go wrong with three top-notch hip hop producers, and overall they did a really good job, backing up LL with some really dense funk and soul landscapes. Some of it does feel standard, though, as the music is awfully typical of East Coast music circa 1993: ultra-thick basslines that seem to drown out virtually any other sound in the beat. But the important thing is that they give LL Cool J’s hectic lyrics the buoyancy they need, especially when they border on the trite and forced. Besides, the album is not entirely free from curveballs. Bobcat throws one at the end with “Crossroads,” supporting LL’s rhymes of doom and gloom with classical-styled soaring strings and choir vocals. To say that it’s an absolute delight to hear is a gross understatement.

According to Bobcat, it took about 105 tracks to record “Crossroads,” and he used a full harmonic orchestra for the song. Left entirely to him, “Crossroads” should have been the first single, primed to not only sustain the momentum of Mama Said Knock You Out, but also take LL to the next level of his music career. Marley Marl, still in charge, went with “How I’m Comin’” instead. In fact, “Crossroads” was never released as a single. That decision became a microcosm of the singles’—and album’s—fate. “How I’m Comin’” and “Back Seat” missed the Top 40. “Stand By Your Man,” which didn’t chart at all, ironically would be nominated for the same Grammy award in 1994 that “Mama Said Knock You Out” won in 1992, only to lose to “Let Me Ride” by…Dr. Dre.

Ultimately, not as many people were impressed with LL Cool J gittin’ wreck for the nine-trey. 14 Shots to the Dome became the first LL album to fall short of the Platinum mark. The truth is, LL was a hard rapper, but never a hardcore rapper. At best, he was a tough-talking teenager B-boy-style in Radio. Heck, he hadn’t been that hard since that album. So, the switch to street seemed sudden and jarring, and many people were put off by it. Granted, some tracks hit the target, but others either grazed or missed entirely. Overall, 14 Shots to the Dome was LL’s first official bomb.