EWA100 - #73. 3rd Bass - The Gas Face

73. 3rd Bass (feat. Zev Luv X) - The Gas Face (Def Jam. 1989. From the LP The Cactus Album)

Raven Mack: This has been a terribly hard blurb for me try and write because I absolutely detest everything about MC Serch, almost to a comical level... like he could resurrect Syd Barrett and Sun Ra and have them playing some weird free form jazz shit for some crazy unknown collective of hungry MCs who were half Wu Tang and half Freestyle Fellowship to just rip verses over, and I'd still hate Serch. And I guess this makes me feel uncomfortable because of the whole Expert Whiteboy Analysis trait of wanting to out-down other whiteboys, of which Serch seems to be the kind, and maybe I'm playa hating on that. But also, and this may even be seen as unconsciously racist on my part by some dumbfucks, I thought he looked stupid with his high top fade. I mean what the fuck? He's a Jewish dude. I can understand being down with black culture and shit, but there is a limit to that, and at some point you might want to add the spices of your own heritage to the melting pot. What little I actually got to see of the White Rapper Show just reinforced this hatred inside of me for Serch.
Serch often would claim he was the best white rapper ever, and this also struck me as odd because he wasn't even the best white rapper in his own group. And I've never felt the hatred for Pete Nice. I used to bump his first solo album like mad. (It should probably be noted when they split up because of the clichéd artistic differences, DJ Daddy Rich - the black dude in 3rd Bass - went with Pete Nice.) So any dislike I have of this song is probably completely related to my hardly justifiable detest of MC Serch. Sure, I saw the video on the MTV back in the days, and it seemed kinda corny, doing a gasface. And yeah, they were not as stupid as MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice, as they were quick to make sure you knew, but still, not being the dumbest kid in special ed doesn't make you a Rhodes Scholar.
And I guess I shouldn't hate on it for being a corny song, because this was a corny time in rap, and were it not for such goofy sixth grade gimmickry in abundance, Wu Tang or Illmatic would not have been such a fresh shower of grime in the midst of this commercial crap masquerading as art.

Mike Dikk: As far as I’m concerned, the two 3rd base LP’s are a solid 4 mics each (based on The Source’s legendary 5 mic scale of course). Hell, the beats alone could have gotten these 4 mics. The Pete Nice solo is somewhere around the 3 and a half mic range and that MC Serch record just sucked a dick.
With that out of the way, "The Gas Face" was a great song at the time. I still to this day like 3rd Base, but there were a lot of fists that were kidneys deep into this song to make sure it was a hit. First off, 3rd Base was signed/created by Russell Simmons to replace the Beastie Boys who had just left Def Jam. The idea for the song was thought up by Zev Luv X, bka MF Doom, aka Doom. The beat was hooked up by Prince Paul, who at the time, was coming off of 3 Feet High and Rising and was fucking untouchable, and lastly, the beat wasn’t even meant for 3rd Base. It was originally supposed to be used by Eric B. & Rakim (self correction: This is more than likely wrong. More reliable sources say it was actually the "Steppin' to the A.M." beat that was offered to Eric B. & Rakim first.), but they passed on it. Simply put, there was no fucking way this song was going to fail. You could get two of the worst white rappers ever and they wouldn’t fuck this up, even if they were from Serch’s White Rapper Show talent pool. Jon Boy and Persia could be all over this track forgetting their lines every 8 seconds and saying something Eminem said 6 years ago and it wouldn’t matter.
I know it sounds like I’m trying to defend my love for this song by making excuses as to why it’s so good, but that’s not the case. I already said I thought 3rd Base’s entire output (outside of the Serch record) is dope, but I do realize 3rd Bass was more than two white faces and one black DJ that stood in the back, and no amount of MC Serch Jew Fro To High Top Fade jackassery can stop me from liking the great music that they helped make along with Russell Simmons and the rest of Def Jam’s staff.
Speaking of Serch, a lot of people question his legitimacy, even more so because of this White Rapper Show bullshit. The fact that every time his name is scrolled across the screen, “Hip Hop Icon” scrolls right under it doesn’t help his case. Pete Nice on the other hand has completely denounced Hip Hop and lives a quiet life in Cooperstown, NY running a baseball museum.
Now, I don’t know how much the average baseball museum owner makes, but I doubt his pockets are that fat, and he’s probably had to switch over from those fat Cuban cigars to Black ‘N Milds. I also imagine he’s gained some weight in his old age and has one of those dirty stubble beards and oily skin where it always looks like you just ate an entire pizza that anyone involved in baseball cards gets after a while. He may even be so fat that he needs one of his pimp ass walking sticks to actually walk, and not just to pimp.
I bet every day he goes home to his modest house, which I imagine is mostly brown tones for some reason, and smoke stained from the Black ‘N Milds, and he sits down in a heavily worn in La-Z-Boy recliner with a plate of fish sticks and vegges out in front of the TV. The TV, of course, is the wood paneled kind with knobs, to match the smoke stained brown tone motif. He probably settles in on some music station to reminisce about old times but only finds complete garbage rap and feels justified in leaving the hip hop business behind. I also bet that not too long ago, he flipped (or turned the knob) to VH1 and saw Serch’s goofy ass with a bunch of white kid rappers in tow and he got so fucking pissed he threw his fish sticks to the ground in disgust and hurled a sealed complete set 89 Donruss Box from the pile of card sets he was using as a makeshift dinner tray right at the TV with enough strength to crack the screen on that fucker.

Download: 3rd Bass - The Gas Face BONUS DOWNLOAD: KMD - Gasface Refill

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