Which makes you more uncomfortable, the cartoon gangsta MC who treats women like pieces of meat, or the rapper who spews invective at the women he thinks made him suffer? Slug (Sean Daley), the MC who along with DJ-producer Ant make up the Minneapolis hip-hop group Atmosphere, first made a splash in 2000 with "The Lucy Ford" EPs, which chronicled his breakup with his girlfriend. Two albums later, he now releases "Seven's Travels," a more sonically sophisticated work that nevertheless indicates Slug is still obsessed with female inconstancy. In most cases, the objects of his scorn are women who won't sleep with him, even if he realizes "I'm just another thief/came to take a piece and make you stutter when you breathe." There's passion in Slug's rhymes, which read as well as they sound; and they sound great in front of Ant's scratchy soul records and tunnel-excavating big beats. "Gotta thing for the women who don't love themselves," Slug crows. He gives suffering as well as he gets it.
