Clipse

Hip-hop has ballers bigger and necks rougher than Malice and Pusha T, the two Virginia Beach brothers who make up Clipse. But nobody in rap combines street-level grit and high-life hedonism like these two insanely talented MCs, whose 2002 debut, Lord Willin’, did a lot to usher in the current crack-rap craze. The duo’s stylistic hallmark is its deadpan cool, the bored detachment with which the ex-dealers survey the violence and excess swirling around them.

In interviews, Malice and Pusha T have spoken plainly about the anger that fueled the creation of Hell Hath No Fury, the follow-up that’s finally seeing release this month after a protracted legal battle with Jive Records. (In true hustler style, the fight ended with Clipse scoring a distribution deal for its Re-Up Gang label.)

Yet Fury doesn’t sound very furious; throughout the disc, the MCs maintain a casual calm that suggests something far scarier than rage: amorality. The result is as terrifying as it is electrifying. Like Lord Willin’,Fury was produced entirely by the Neptunes, whose stripped-down robo-funk pairs perfectly with Clipse’s storytelling. In one highlight, “Ride Around Shining,” the rappers brag about driving “the greatest of Porsches” on top of what sounds like a prison guard running his truncheon along the bars of a cell; the juxtaposition ingeniously illustrates the chasm between crack rap’s surface sheen and its far less glamorous reality. This album is full of profound moments like that. — Mikael Wood