From the Ghetto (Scotti Brothers, 1991)

It's difficult to call this album reggae, but for the sake of argument, we'll go ahead and do so.  I suppose you could call it hip-hop reggae, but the style put forth is more akin to then-contemporary (1991) Soul II Soul.  The title track in particular features that characteristically laid-back, heavy drum machine hip-hop/dance beat that Soul II Soul rode to success.  It's unfortunate, because the dated sound detracts from what is an otherwise lovely, haunting melody (sung by Jah-T, one of the so-called Modern Tone Age Family. . . How can they expect anyone to take them seriously with these names?).  Dread Flimstone, incidentally, doesn't sing; he's the producer and mastermind behind this project (Well, mastermind may be a bit too strong  a term -- can you really be a mastermind if what you come up with is junk?).   Besides the title track, only the funk/R&B sound of "Roots" stirs anything inside me (aside from nausea).  The rest of this dance/hip-hop crap struggles to be merely so-so.  "Fantasy," in particular, is putrid pop/dance with bad singing and a bad melody, while "Police" is a laughable, dated hip-hop instrumental that desperately wants to be militant like NWA's "Fuck the Police" and Body Count's "Cop Killer". . . C'mon, the guy's name is Dread Flimstone!