Happy 20th Anniversary to Leak Bros’ debut & only album Waterworld, originally released July 13, 2004.
The Leak Bros’ Waterworld is very much a product of its era. It’s an album that only could have been released by an independent label like Eastern Conference during the mid-2000s. The project, released 20 years ago, is a full-throated “narcotic product endorsement” of PCP a.k.a. Angel Dust a.k.a. Leak a.k.a. Water a.k.a. Sherm a.k.a. Death.
Throughout the album, Chris “Cage” Palko and Rahem “Tame One” Brown (R.I.P.) each outline their experiences taking the drug, which involves smoking cigarettes (often filled with marijuana) dipped in embalming fluid. As completely unappetizing as that sounds, Waterworld succeeds in being one of the great albums of the mid-’00s. As Tame One said in numerous interviews, it’s the dusted version of Method Man and Redman’s Blackout (1999).
For those who don’t know, phenylcyclohexyl piperidine is one seriously fucked up drug. You take enough of it, and you can feel impervious to pain, but you can experience a serious psychotic episode and figuratively fracture your mind beyond repair. Usage of the drug has been present in hip-hop since its earliest days. Rappers have even recorded tracks singing its praises: “Smoking Stix” appeared on Coolio’s debut album, while Jayo Felony’s “Sherm Stick” was long considered the definitive PCP anthem. The Leak Bros take things to another level, dedicating their entire over 40-minute project to their recreational use of the drug.
I won’t front: Waterworld comes together better than I could have possibly imagined. Its success is due to the talents of all the parties involved, both lyrically and musically. Cage is a unique talent. Long wracked with mental health issues, he has used rapping as an outlet to vent his scarred psyche since the 1990s, often conjuring grotesque imagery on record. Here, shermed out of his mind, he utilizes a similar formula. “PCP-Funk All Star” Tame-One, best known as one half of the Artifacts duo, is one of the most technically skilled emcees of his era. Throughout this project, he utilizes his talent to craft complex flows and clever wordplay.
The album starts with a pair of Camu Tao-produced joints, “Got Wet” and the title track. The former involves the two rocking over a gravelly electric guitar sample and thumping drums. On the grim dirge of a title track, the pair envisions a “drug related theme park,” populated by leaked-out fiends. There “folks that's perfectly dry get kinda soaked” by Tame-One’s thoughts.
Listen to the Album:
An intrinsic ingredient to Waterworld’s success is the production, as the Leak Bros enlist some of the best beat-makers working in the hip-hop indie scene at the time. RJD2 hooks up a banging string sample from a Japanese Enka singer and pairs it with a complex drum pattern on “Gimmiesomedeath.” “G.O.D.” features some of J-Zone’s best work, as he expertly chops guitar licks and keyboard tones. He gives it his quirky and left-of-center spin so that it sounds perfect for Tame and Cage’s blitzed stylings.
Tracks like “See Thru” and “Follow the Liters” are slices of psychedelic hip-hop perfection. The Mondee-produced former is particularly strong, as the duo describes how PCP ravages the body both physically and psychologically. Tame’s verse detailing a visit to an ex-girl now consigned to a mental institution after “smok[ing] wet raw” is legitimately tragic. Camu Tao’s more melancholy production on “Delerium” also provides a great sonic backdrop, as the duo describes the mind-destroying hallucinations that one can experience while under the wet influence.
Waterworld features a solo track from each member of the duo. With “Druggie Fresh,” Tame-One contributes a dusted cover of “La Di Da Di,” flexing over echoing percussion. The Mighty Mi-produced “Stargate” sounds like a Giorgio Moroder-inspired nightmare narrated by “PCPeeping Tom” Cage, further excavating into his own agitated and drug-addled mind. “I gave up on suicide, y'all have to take me off this planet!” he snarls.
“Dead” is deeply unsettling based on the beat alone, as DJ Mighty Mi samples gothic organs and whimpers from the soundtrack of a Japanese horror flick. Cage and Tame use suitably bleak imagery, considering “suicide” via PCP, with Cage asserting that he’d “rather be dead than the guy who raps about how great he is.” For the album-ending “Submurged,” El-P creates a dystopian musical hellscape for Tame and Cage to traverse as a pair of PCP-fueled soldiers, conducting their own version of Fight Club’s “Project: Mayhem.” (“10 points for every disabled SUV; first one to a million wins,” Cage quips. “And rapper’s trucks are worth 20.”)
Waterworld was the Leak Bros’ only album. Cypress Hill may be able to build a three-decade-plus career around the joys of smoking marijuana, but Cage and Tame One doing something similar for PCP seems implausible. Especially after they make it explicitly clear how seriously the drug fucks you up. So Waterworld ending up as a one-and-done project is likely for the best. And though I will never, never, NEVER use the stuff, I can appreciate their effort in transforming the use of such an unappealing drug into such a high-quality album.
Listen: