Belly
Jam-packed with classy tracks and saddled with a minimum of filler,Bellyis the best hip-hop soundtrack to come down the pike since Death Row'sGang Related. The prerequisite soundtrack ballads are quickly dispensed with by a couple of R. Kelly productions and a Stevie Wonder cover, thus leaving plenty of room for the more fierce musical attacks by the likes of the film's stars--DMX, Method Man, and Nas--as well as Jay-Z, Noreaga, and Sauce Money. The album takes on a progressively more harrowing feel as it moves along (aided by excerpts of dialogue from the film), culminating in an incredible Wu-Tang Clan track, "Windpipe," in which the manic spitting craziness of Wu-Tang at their best is paired up with an eerie, incongruous banjo loop.--Charley Gothic