Method Man METH LAB

Composer: Cardi. Recording information: Trackstar Studio. Illustrator: Rich Lock. With his Wu-Tang colleague Ghostface off doing ambitious concept albums while team leader RZA offers million-dollar LPs as art pieces, Method Man's The Meth Lab is a ramshackle delight, coming nine years after his last solo joint and not giving a damn. Walking into the room with a shrug and then slaying the competition is what Meth does best, and as the title track drops the old and utterly brilliant reference "Like 'Confessions of a Video Vixen,' we by the book," it's obvious he's on point here, and remains so throughout the album. Halfway through, the vengeful "Water" paints the Wu-Tang's great anchorman as a pathos-filled soul doling out moral judgments ("They done killed the homie's brother, what you supposed to do with that?/Who gonna tell his baby mother that her dude ain't comin' back"), while "Rain All Day" is the kind of wicked Wu swaggering, humorous, enemy-kicking anthem ("You monkeys hangin' '