*** Jeru the Damaja

WRATH OF THE MATH

(Payday/London)

Jeru the Damaja's second album could have borrowed its title from the late Tupac Shakur's Me Against the World. This time around our hero finds himself defending hip-hop from greedy materialists (read: Foxy Brown and Lil' Kim) who would rather line the pockets of Italian designers than develop the art form. In "The Bullshit," Jeru runs down the litany of current hip-hop clichés (living large with drug money, and other pseudo-Mafia trappings). The first single, "Ya Playin' Yourself," uses the break from Junior Mafia's "Player's Anthem" to attack Junior by praising the virtues of honesty and clean living. On "One Day," Jeru aims to save hip-hop alongside his beat-mining accomplice, DJ Premier. He even calls out the kingpins of hip-hop's two biggest labels, Sean "Puffy" Combs (Bad Boy) and Suge Knight (Death Row).

The musical presence here is unmistakably D.J. Premier, who's always pushing the boundaries with mixes like the intergalactic "Physical Stamina" (featuring Afu-Ra) and "Me or the Paper," where he juxtaposes a piano line with a chorus that features the ring of a cash register. Jeru occasionally slips into KRS-ONE self-righteousness, but when you consider hip-hop's recent blurring of the line between art and life, that's probably not such a bad thing.

-- Adam Matthews

(Jeru the Damaja opens for the Roots at Avalon this Friday, November 15.)