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The AZ Delivery
Yet AZ should also be known for his own qualities, especially his creativity and originality, his 25-cent word choices, and his buttery smooth style. You don't know what I'm talking about? Then you haven't listened to AZ.
We can't overlook what the Englewood, New Jersey native did with Nas though. He was there, after all, in 1994, when Nas released the album titled "Life's a Bitch." If you were around back then, you'd remember that the album had people calling Nas the second coming of a rap god, and you'd remember that AZ was a guest MC-the only guest MC-on the entire album.
Firming up His Own Success
AZ jumped on the success train after that before it left the station, getting signed onto the EMI label and releasing the first solo AZ album a year after in 1995, called "Doe or Die." Was that his big break? The AZ record didn't break any sales records, though it got Anthony Cruz mad respect in the hip hop community. Of course, some commercial success came out of it, notably the AZ single "Sugar Hill," which went top 25.
Not one to let opportunity pass him by, AZ built on his growing solo fame by joining what's considered one of rap's super groups, The Firm. Besides AZ, the group contained Nature, Nas, and Foxy Brown. Master megaproducer Dr. Dre produced the group along with The Trackmasters. Not a bad mix of talent, right?
Yet amazingly, for all this talent joined at the hip with AZ, The Firm's one album, called of all thing "The Album," didn't turn any heads or make any waves, or do any cliche act that suggests any sort of importance.
Piecing Together His Career
The solo artist tried to rebound with a second AZ album titled "Pieces of a Man," which didn't impress too many folks either. By 2000, Anthony Cruz was putting out AZ lyrics on his own records, such as "S.O.S.A"-again, not a big winner on the rap shelves in the stores.
After this AZ album, though, he got signed onto to Motown and Universal and got another album out there, "9 Lives." How apropos! It was here that if you listen to AZ, you can sense the artists getting his act back together. You see, it wasn't too much later (in 2002, in fact) that he put out "Aziatic," off which one AZ song called "The Essence" got him in the running for a Grammy.
Since then, more AZ records have come out, including "A.W.O.L." in 2005 and "The Format" in 2006. The latest album from Anthony Cruz was just released in April 2008, called "Undeniable."
