Busta Rhymes delivered his debut album,
The Coming, three years after
the Leaders of the New School unofficially disbanded, and it reflects the change in hip-hop between 1993 and 1996.
The Coming is indebted to the slow, spare, and quietly menacing funk and soundscapes of
the Wu-Tang Clan -- in fact,
Ol' Dirty Bastard appears on one of the album's most infectious tracks, the single "Woo Ha!! Got You All in Check."
Busta Rhymes, like
Ol' Dirty, is a surreal, inspired rapper, but his skills are on a whole different level. Though his talents were evident on the
Leaders of the New School records,
Busta Rhymes has never had such an impressive showcase for his rhymes as he does on
The Coming.
Busta doesn't have a deep message in his raps, but he twists words and phrases around with an insane, invigorating flair. Like many hip-hop albums of the mid-'90s,
The Coming is padded with too much material, but
Busta Rhymes' brilliant raps keep the record from sinking during its monotonous passages. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine