The first part of this guide gave a brief overview of the albums released during the Golden Age of Wu-Tang Clan. For this part of the guide, I'll expand on some of the concepts covered in the last section, and explain a bit more about what happened after the Golden Age. To understand this, I'll first go over RZA's 5 Year Plan.
The 5 Year Plan
RZA, as the producer and leader of Wu-Tang Clan had the most influence over its early direction. While shopping for an initial record deal, the Clan struggled, because they required that every member be able to sign with a different label if they so chose. The Clan also wished to retain nearly complete creative control over its own projects. Eventually they managed to get the deal they sought (again, this is what Wikipedia/Google/etc. is/are for). This was the beginning of RZA's 5 Year Plan. The basic idea is what follows: for the first 5 years (1993-1997) the RZA would maintain creative directorial control over all Wu-Tang releases. For those five years he produced and executive produced all the albums released. He also masterminded many Wu-Tang affiliate groups on various Wu-related albums, and brought about the creation of Wu-Tang Clan's clothing line, Wu-Wear. Once the Wu brand was firmly established with a uniform sound and uniform quality, the group members would diversify with different sounds, producers and side projects. This would allow for the Wu-Tang Clan to have as much music industry power and influence as possible. RZA's plan was thought out in far more detail than I have described. Of course, things didn't go quite as planned.
After the first five years, where all the Wu projects released were incredibly successful (except Wu-Wear, and good) RZA instructed all the members of Wu-Tang to go out and work with affiliates and outside producers for their next projects, while he and Ghostface worked together on his second album (and what many consider to be his best), Supreme Clientele. During this period Method Man, GZA, RZA, ODB, Raekwon, U-God and Inspectah Deck released albums. GZA's album, while not as acclaimed as the indispensible Liquid Swords, is still an excellent addition to the Wu-Tang cannon. Even though it is a bit skit heavy (although none of them are terrible or too long) which disrupts the flow of the album, the album still succeeds in expanding on Wu repertoire. The same goes for Inspectah Deck's debut album, Uncontrolled Substance. This album was actually supposed to be released in the first round of Wu releases with complete RZA production. Due to the flood of RZA's studio, etc. the album was lost and later re-recorded with Deck production instead. Method Man, U-God and Raekwon's albums all fall completely flat, with varying levels of failure and financial success. RZA and ODB's albums proved to be the most divisive for many fans. Unlike the Meth, Rae and U-God albums they're not flat-out failures, rather interesting experiments in a different area of hip hop. You'll either like them or you won't, but the efforts are admirable in any case.
As mentioned previously, RZA left all the members of Wu-Tang to fend for themselves (to varied success) while he "called dibs" on Ghostface. The results of this are two prison sentences (assault and possession of a firearm) a several month trip to Africa and the writing and recording of the album Supreme Clientele. The importance of this album to Wu-Tang cannot be overstated. Coming out after Raekwon's Immobilarity, one of the most disappointing releases of the second round, Supreme Clientele signaled the Wu's return to prominence, something that their third group album The W would firmly establish in 2000.
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