The Ghostface Killah Rises Again

Rap Genius 

Ghostface Killah is a compulsive storyteller. His fiction is painterly, and he delivers it in a headlong rush.

Ghostface onstage

 On "Impossible," from the 1997 album Wu-Tang Forever, he rhymed, "He pointed to the charm on his neck / With his last bit of energy left, told me rock it with respect / I opened it, seen the God holdin' his kids / Photogenic, tears just burst out my wig." He's a romantic, in his own way, and never stoic.

He prefers to work with members and affiliates of the groundbreaking and influential Wu-Tang Clan, which he co-founded. "Not everybody can tell a really good story," he says. "They veterans." As is he. For 20 years he's been playing unreliable narrators and characters who second-guess themselves. Yelling, going for broke whenever he's in front of a microphone. Ol' Dirty Bastard may have had no father to his style, but its Ghostface who's still the same guy we met back in 1993.

Born Dennis Coles on Staten Island, New York City, he can now, at the age of 42, look back on a career that's seen him play an integral part in one of the most respected groups in hip-hop history and release equally successful solo work. He's toured the world several times over, but he's not done yet.

What he's doing now is a concept album about an Italian gangster betrayed, murdered and resurrected as a black superhero bent on revenge.

The Wu-Tang Clan's 20-Year Plan
This year marks the 20th anniversary of a remarkable year in music. Over the 12 months of 1993, Queen Latifah, De La Soul, Salt-N-Pepa, Snoop Dogg, A Tribe Called Quest and more than a dozen other rappers released albums that helped to change the sound of America. One of those albums wasn't just a collection of songs — it was a business concept, too. The Wu-Tang Clan's 1993 debut was the opening shot of an audacious plan to open the music industry to hip-hop made way outside the mainstream.
Protect Ya Neck Wu-Tang Clan - Da Mystery Of Chessboxin'

First Listen: Ghostface Killah And Adrian Younge, 'Twelve Reasons To Die'
Twelve Reasons to Die is a rap album that begins with an overture and ends with an instrumental coda. The songs were composed by Adrian Younge, a producer and musician who's fairly new to the scene, recorded live and authored by a rapper with 20 years in the business, the Ghostface Killah, a member of the Wu-Tang Clan. The result is unusual — a vivid and intricate melodrama that's both backward-looking and forward-thinking.