The Further Adventures…

On release, The Great Adventures was hailed as a slice of peerless hip hop storytelling. It’s since been called one of the 100 Greatest Hip Hop Albums by The Source, as well as being called the 99th Best Album of the ‘80s by Slant Magazine. Nas has cited it as one of his 25 favourite albums.

Unfortunately, Rick’s career was interrupted by one of hip hop’s more outrageous series of events. The year following The Great Adventures, Rick’s mother hired his cousin, Mark Plummer, as his bodyguard. What started as a family affair quickly spiralled into something more serious: Plummer tried multiple times to extort money from Rick, going as far as to threaten violence against both him and his mother. In July of 1990, after finding bullet holes in his door, Rick finally attacked Plummer. He fired four shots: one hit Plummer in the foot, and another hit a bystander. Whilst no one suffered life-threatening injuries, Rick was swiftly taken into custody.

The ensuing case - The People of the State of New York v. Richard Walters - found Rick pleading guilty to two counts of attempted murder. He spent five years in prison, all the while fighting to remain in the United States, as he was born in the UK. Efforts to maintain his artistic momentum were fraught: Russell Simmons bailed him out in ‘91, leading to the recording of The Ruler’s Back, which was both critically and commercially lukewarm. ‘94’s Behind Bars, released whilst serving his sentence, was similarly disappointing. Simmons interviewed Rick at Rikers Correctional Facility for 1995 hip hop documentary, The Show.

It was his first post-release record, 1999’s The Art Of Storytelling, that finally made good on the promise of his ‘88 debut. After a decade of legal troubles and disappointing LPs, the 21-track album featured appearances from acts such as Outkast, Redman, Nas and Raekwon, and production from Kid Capri, DJ Clark Kent and Jazze Pha. It became Rick’s most commercially successful album, peaking at #8 on the Billboard 100 and earning rave reviews. It remains his most recent solo LP.

The trouble didn’t end there: Rick was detained by Immigration officials in June 2001, who started the drawn-out process of deporting the UK national to his country of origin. After their initial attempt failed, they attempted to push the case through a more conservative court, an attempt that was subsequently frustrated by Governor David A. Peterson’s 2008 pardon. It stopped the deportation efforts in its tracks, and since then, Rick has become an American citizen.

Slick Rick’s story is one of excellence, hardship and atonement. Though his journey has been defined by hardship, his shadow still casts long over the rap game. One of the most sampled hip hop artists of all time, interpolations of the Ruler abound: from Miley Cyrus to Future, his legacy continues to appear on the charts, three decades doing little to lessen the cultural memory of his greatest hits. Whilst his own adventures were oft-trying, his impact on the scene is nothing if not truly great.