Iron Flag - Absences

Absences

Ol' Dirty Bastard's contributions to the Wu-Tang's group albums continued to decrease with each successive album: after being one of the main stars of Enter the Wu-Tang: 36 Chambers, he was by far the least prolific Clan member on the group's follow-up album Wu-Tang Forever. He then made only one appearance on The W (on the song "Conditioner") due to being engulfed in legal troubles; legal troubles which in the year separating The W and Iron Flag had only gotten worse. Consequently, ODB does not appear on Iron Flag at all, making The W the final Wu-Tang album to feature him. He does, however, appear on 8 Diagrams posthumously.

Another absentee is Cappadonna: after being merely a very close affiliate of the group on Wu-Tang Forever, he appeared to have become absorbed into the group itself as a full member on The W (tracks with his contributions no longer being marked as "featuring Cappadonna"). In the year following the release of The W Cappadonna had become dissatisfied with being in the group (RZA has said he felt unhappy that people outside of the group did not respect him as much as the original nine members) and had also been in dispute with the group over the revelation that his manager Michael Caruso was a police informant. Whatever the case, he does not appear on the album. Although, it should be noted that he appears on the original cover of the album but was air brushed out. The original cover appears on the back of the "Wu-Tang Manual" by RZA. This suggests that he might have been removed from the album in post production.