Anybody who's a fan of urban music is hearing a lot of Nate Dogg these days. The burly crooner who escaped from Death Row is remaking himself as a chorus for hire, someone who can step in and take an average song and make it an instant hit. "Area Codes" by Ludacris would have been another loud brother scraping for radio spins without Nate's dulcet tones. "High Come Down" featured two rappers nobody had ever heard of, but their every line became more wonderful with the promise of Nate Dogg moaning the hook in just a few more bars. "Da GoodLife" became an underground hit that outlived the And 1 compilation that spawned it, not because of gangster rappers from two coasts (Kurupt and Nas, respectively), but because of Nate's drawing power. Put him on a song with someone serious—"Lay Low" by Snoop or "Oh No" on the Lyricist Lounge compilation with Pharoahe Monch and Mos Def, for example—and you've got something incredible on your hands.

"Hannibal, uh, that's cool and all," you're probably thinking, "but this is a site about comics." True enough, and let me make my connection now: I've been looking around and noted there are names like this in comics, ensemble players who really shine when you drop them into almost any situation.

Take, for instance, Greg Rucka. Now, you may not like the spy action of Queen & Country (I do), and his work on Detective Comics may not jibe with you (though it does for me), but when he showed up for an issue of Tangled Web (a lot of people confuse the subtitle with the title of the book, so "The Book That Was Called 'The Thousand' Last Month" for anyone who's confused), he showed up ready to do the damned thing. The tale of a Kingpin henchman getting an "early retirement" is the kind of behind-the-scenes story that rarely gets told, and what's more, it's compellingly told. Greg Rucka, like Nate Dogg (a comparison, I'd wager, that neither of them would ever venture) can both step in and rock a wide variety of projects.

Or how about some artists? Look at ChrisCross and Steve Dillon. Both have very crisp, clear styles. Both work their magic on two of Marvel's better books, Captain Marvel and The Punisher, respectively. Dillon held the reins for a long time on Vertigo's Preacher. Chriscross has been in the trenches for years as well, carrying the load on some books you remember and some you probably don't (think Milestone). Cast either in the Nate Dogg role, and you're talking something special.

There are lots of other names we could mention: Calafiore, McDuffie, Golden, Hama, and so on, but you get the point. One of the major advantages of being a comic book fan for so many years is being able to note the many distinct possibilities different sets of creators might bring to any given title. Go back and dig up that Kurt Busiek Spider-Man story, or that little-known early Alex Ross. It all comes back to misunderstood visionaries like Nate Dogg, doing the work and making a living at it, and it goes for names that aren't so big now: Doug Miers (The Exec), Jacen Burrows (Bad World), etc. I'm just interested in pushing their names out a little more, or as KRS-ONE said, "When a dope lyrical flow is a must, you got to go with a name you can quickly trust!"

One a strange side note: I picked up Doug Miers' The Exec in the store today completely by accident (my comics pusher, Jason at Comics Ink, was afraid the gorgeous Chad Michael Ward cover would hold something loserish) and was very pleasantly surprised. Check for his steez (which is very interesting and surprisingly innovative) at www.comicsconspiracy.com. They're trying a fascinating tactic of tying one wacky post-apocalyptic story ("Accounts Deceivable") through three titles and bundling it onto CD-ROM (which I'll order the second their online store comes back up). Looking outside the limitations of the direct market, children. Let's all take note, and keep trying new solutions.