Wu-Tang Clan 8 Dograms: Hip Hop Legends Return With First Album In 6 Years

Vancouver, BC. (Top40 Charts/ Bodog Music) - Fourteen years into a remarkable career, New York's finest release 8 Diagrams through Bodog Music, their first album since 2001 and their first since the premature death of Old Dirty Bastard in 2004.

Overseen by Rza, self-proclaimed abbot of the Wu-Tang Clan, 8 Diagrams sees all members step up and remind the musical world what they've been missing for the past few years. Though the release of their seminal debut Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) in 1993 seems like a lifetime ago, the anticipation surrounding the release of 8 Diagrams illustrates that the collective talents of Rza, Gza, Method Man, Ghostface Killah, Raekwon, Inspectah Deck, U-God and Masta Killa have lost none of their potency. In between then and now, the Wu became the first hip hop group to score a simultaneous No. 1 on both sides of the Atlantic with 1997's Wu-Tang Forever.

The highlights of 8 Diagrams are many, though much has been made of "The Heart Gently Weeps," the first single due for release in January.

The song is based on an interpolation of The Beatles' "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and features George Harrison's son, Dhani, as well as Red Hot Chili Peppers' guitarist John Frusciante and soul singer Erykah Badu.

Old Dirty Bastard is very much in the band's thoughts. Rza explains how each surviving Clansman "came on and said some lyrics, sayin' goodbye to ODB and givin' some last-minute thoughts on him" on "Life Changes." Dirty appears too on "Chamber Number Nine," an old track recently rediscovered in the Wu-Tang vaults, which will be on European versions of the album.

The Wu provided one of the hottest tickets of the summer with their show at the Hammersmith Apollo in July, which the Guardian called "wondrous." The band then went on to steal the show at both the Oxygen and T In The Park festivals, giving fans a tempting glimpse of what they can expect on the forthcoming 8 Diagrams.