Steve 'Flash' JuonEven as someone who enjoys listening to and sharing reviews of little known rap groups, Some Nuts Outtha Projects a/k/a S.N.O.P. is putting the “O” in obscure — and Oakland. The duo of Mr. Key and T-Nut proudly hail from West O and represent it for Treasure Line Records. The grind and hustle of Cali rappers is never to be doubted. Long before self-publishing was possible for anybody with a computer and an internet connection, the left coast were DIY kings, and being the world’s 10th largest economy if California was a country and not a state undoubtedly has something to do with it. There’s HELLA incentive to strike out on your own. If you can reach any audience locally, you don’t even have to worry about going national, because you’ve already got it made.
S.N.O.P. was on the right track. Despite the ridiculous title of “Nutt’In All Over Your Face,” an album name guaranteed to NOT be prominently displayed on store shelves, the songs themselves have the swagger of West coast 1990’s G-Funk. Take “Mackadamian Nuts” for example. Thanks to well chosen samples of Zapp’s “Computer Love” and Funkadelic’s “Good Old Music,” this song can get play in any ride today. The aptly named (and sadly deceased) Krushadelic cameos on this track as well. Complete with the obvious Snoop Dogg sample for the hook, this is finely aged Oakland hip-hop. They were also incredibly open minded in their rap stance. Despite the East vs. West rivalry heating up, they looped the drums from Ultramagnetic M.C.’s “Feelin’ It” for “2 Nuts High and Rising,” a song whose title also pays tribute to New York stalwarts De La Soul.
I’ve been fairly positive about S.N.O.P. to this point, but if you listen to this album it can’t escape your notice that “Nut” is a recurring gimmick. It’s in their group name, it’s in their album name, it’s in the name of one of the members, and it’s in SONG AFTER SONG. Half of the 16 tracks here manage to squeeze in a “Nut” no matter how much of a stretch it was for them to bust it. I can’t prove the album title alone made it hard for them to find distribution outside Cali, but their insistence on their nutty gimmick certainly did. It’s good to have a way to stand out from the competition, but silly tracks like “Squirrels Uh Do Anything For a Nut” hurt them as much or more than the album’s name. It’s a funk heavy track that would have been much better without squirrels being substituted for girls.
The more I look at the cover of “Nutt’In All Over Your Face” though the less inclined I am to think S.N.O.P. wanted to be taken seriously. There’s no way they thought that pose was anything other than absurd. It’s like a freeze frame of somebody trying very hard to NOT bust a nut. It’s not mean mugging, it’s mean nutting. S.N.O.P. have the parental advisory sticker next to this goofy picture, so you know it’s meant for a mature audience, but you’d be hard pressed to hand it to somebody and not have them think it’s a stand-up comedy CD. When they’re not busy “nutting” though they’re more than happy to roll up some Cali funk and smoke it on “Buds From Da Stem” featuring Underground Rebellion.
And who are Underground Rebellion you ask? Good question. They consist of Jullie D and the aforementioned Krushadelic. They are Treasure Line labelmates with S.N.O.P., and when Treasure Line folded they followed Mr. Key to Armada Entertainment, seemingly founded by the same people. These Oakland rap dreams didn’t die easy, they died HARD. The 90’s run was followed by an 00’s run that may have been even more obscure, and the last album I can find from any of these brothers is the late Krushadelic’s “Ghost Rider” solo effort in 2007. Back to Mr. Key and T-Nut though — “West Oakland” is the kind of throw-your-hood-up anthem that would make them a local radio favorite. It still resonates today thanks to their pride in the town they’re from.
“Nutt’In All Over Your Face” is an album that succeeds in spite of itself. I’m discovering it 30 years too late to do this group any good, but at least we can put one review out into the world that will give more people a chance to discover S.N.O.P. and listen to them. They handicapped themselves with a double entendre album title that borders on gross, and an insistence on “nutting” all over their song titles, but when you scratch beneath that nuttiness you find some vintage 90’s rap that was vacuum sealed fresh and is surprisingly edible today.