Nah, this is actually an above-average album, though. As a pure rap product of New Jack Swing and as a party album, Hard or Smooth stands up quite well. Unfortunately for Wreckx-N-Effect, who already had been whittled to two members from an original four-man lineup (one member voluntarily left; the other was shot to death), more misfortune would befall them. Within four years, the group ceased to exist—victims of a brick of a third album, and internal squabbling between Aqil and the Riley brothers. But at least, with that moment of success, they helped unleash hordes of other rump shakers into the national scene, a trait that endures in mainstream rap to this day. Now, whether that is a good thing is another story entirely.