Ol' Dirty Bastard

OL' DIRTY BASTARD

Born: Russell Tyrone Jones, a.k.a. Osirus; Brooklyn, New York, 9 May 1970

Genre: Rap

Best-selling album since 1990: Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version (1995)

Hit songs since 1990: "Shimmy Shimmy Ya," "Got Your Money"

In a genre where poker-faced solemnity is paramount, Russell Jones is a tragic hip-hop clown of Shakespearean proportions. The erratic, unpredictable rapper, known variously as Ol' Dirty Bastard, Dirt Dog, Big Baby Jesus, and Osirus, rose to fame in the early 1990s as a member of the pioneering New York rap troupe the Wu-Tang Clan. With the release of his profane, soul-inspired solo debut, Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version (1995), Jones seemed destined for solo stardom as well. Felled by weapons possession charges, multiple drug arrests, and incarcerations, the rapper ended up in prison, his career in a shambles.

Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1969, Russell Jones, a welfare child, helped form the Staten Island–based hip-hop group the Wu-Tang Clan in 1992 with his cousins Robert Diggs (a.k.a. RZA) and Gary Grice (a.k.a. Genius). The group's debut album, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) (1993), was one of the most influential rap albums of the 1990s. With its unique meld of multiple strong rap styles, martial arts imagery, and gritty production style, the album was meant as a launching pad for the solo careers of its nine members. Prior to the album's release, Jones was convicted of second-degree assault in New York; in 1994 he was shot in the stomach by another rapper in Brooklyn following a street argument.

Jones, billed as Ol' Dirty Bastard, released his solo debut album, Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version, in 1995. Built on RZA's patented dark, piano-sampling production style, the album is a maniacal compilation of Jones's singing styles: aggressive sung-spoken rapping, warbling soul crooning, and vulgar stream-of-consciousness rants. "Brooklyn Zoo" and "Shimmy Shimmy Ya" helped the album sell 500,000 copies; its success led to guest work on a remix of Mariah Carey's 1995 song "Fantasy." Among other songs, Ol' Dirty Bastard contributed the intensely scatological "Dog S***" track to the Wu-Tang's hit second album, Wu-Tang Forever (1997).

In November 1997 the twenty-eight-year-old rapper—the father of thirteen children—was arrested for failing to pay almost a year's worth of child support for his three children with wife Icelene Jones. It was the beginning of a career-ending spiral of legal problems.

By 1998 Ol' Dirty Bastard was known more for his unpredictable behavior than for his rapping. Within a few months in early 1998, Ol' Dirty Bastard launched his "Dirty Wear" clothing line, helped save a four-year-old girl from being crushed by a car, and, one night later, interrupted the Grammys during an acceptance speech by rocker Shawn Colvin with a shout of "Wu-Tang is for the children!"

In September, he was arrested for terrorist threats after harassing a security guard at the House of Blues in Los Angeles. Two weeks later, he was removed from the Four Seasons Hotel in Berlin for lounging on a balcony in the nude. In November 1998 Ol' Dirty Bastard pled guilty to threatening to kill his ex-girlfriend. In January 1999 he was pulled over by New York police and allegedly fired shots at the officers, leading to an arrest for attempted murder and criminal weapon possession; police, however, were never able to produce any physical evidence in the case, which was dismissed a month later.

Ol' Dirty Bastard's troubles were hardly over, though. When he was found wearing bulletproof body armor in California in March—an illegality for convicted felons—the rapper became the first person arrested under the new law. Within the next six months, ODB was twice arrested in New York for driving without a license—once with a small amount of crack cocaine in his vehicle; jailed in California for failing to pay bail in the House of Blues case; and arrested once again in New York for driving with a suspended license and possession of marijuana and twenty vials of crack. An arrest warrant was issued in California for failure to appear in the bullet-proof vest case just before the rapper entered a drug rehabilitation program in August.

Amid his string of arrests, Ol' Dirty Bastard released his second solo album, Nigga Please (1999). The album features the minor old school soul hit "Got Your Money," and a comically overwrought piano jazz cover of "Good Morning Heartache," a song popularized by the legendary jazz vocalist Billie Holiday.

In early 2000 Ol' Dirty Bastard was sentenced to a Los Angeles drug treatment facility from which he escaped in October, two months shy of his release. He was on the lam for a month, secretly recording new material with RZA and performing at a record release party for the Wu-Tang Clan in New York in November, somehow escaping without incident. He was apprehended a few days later at a McDonald's in Philadelphia while signing autographs; Ol' Dirty Bastard was later extradited to New York on drug possession charges. In April 2001 he was sentenced to two to four years in prison by a New York Supreme Court judge.

A greatest hits compilation, The Dirty Story: The Best of Ol' Dirty Bastard, was released in August 2001. March 2002 saw the release of The Trials and Tribulations of Russell Jones, a slipshod album of previously unreleased songs and material recorded while he was on the lam. With his legal troubles overshadowing his musical output, both albums were duds, effectively closing the door on Jones's career.

A tragic figure, Russell Jones blazed a bizarre path across the 1990s hip-hop scene until his inner demons and drug addiction resulted in a career-ending prison sentence.

SELECTIVE DISCOGRAPHY:

Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version (Elektra, 1995); Nigga Please (Elektra, 1999); The Dirty Story: The Best of Ol' Dirty Bastard (Elektra, 2001); Trials & Tribulations of Russell Jones (D3, 2002). With Wu-Tang Clan: Enter the Wu-Tang Clan (36 Chambers) (Loud Records, 1993); Wu-Tang Forever (Loud/RCA, 1997); The W (Columbia, 2000).

gil kaufman