Posts Tagged ‘Writing Battle Rap History’

Ca$his | The County Hound 3 | #AlbumReview #CH3

Friday, April 10th, 2015

by Writing Battle Rap History

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CH3 Cover Art

CH3 Cover Art

Album Rating System 3  out of 5 records

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The third album in Cashis’ trilogy of The County Hound is The County Hound 3. In the spirit of dank, makeshift, in-home studios, the beat-smiths that make simple productions, the part-time rapper, part-time weed peddler, the codeine sippers, and gangsters, CH3 is hand crafted just for you.

Cashis has quite a past in the music business starting his career in Orange County, California, where he relocated from his native Chicago. He was discovered in the mid-2000s and signed to Shady Records, where his introduction to the world was on Eminem’s 2006, Eminem Presents: The Re-Up, a compilation album featuring 50 Cent, Lloyd Banks, Bobby Creekwater, and others. From these experiences propelled the career of Cashis and his tenacious hustle that has kept him afloat all these years. Although existing under the surface, he’s been consistent in keeping a buzz in the Internet world, releasing four albums, four EPs, and about thirteen mixtapes.

CH3 falls in between Chicago drill and west coast G-Funk with a tinge of Houston, Texas accented in the pace of the music. The tone of CH3 is defined in the intro where he states, “Real n*ggas only advised to listen. No sucka n*ggas, no soft n*ggas, no squares, no lames, no punks, no frauds.” Cashis’ excessive gangsta talk doesn’t allow for much flexibility in his content, albeit he seems to be at his most comfortable in this position – and not exactly biased about rival gang affiliations, either. This is made clear in Turn Up. “If you Folks you my folks/F*ck a hater n*gga/…My little brother Gucci getting that paper n*gga/and that’s my blood, black, P-Stone Ranger, n*gga.”

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Moving from Chicago to Irvine, California, a suburb in the O.C., is depicted by Cashis as a place that is overlooked for its gang affiliations. A

Ca$his

Ca$his

few years ago gang members and thugs from the outskirts of the inner city would be placed in a wanna-be caste system, but nowadays, because of a falling middle-class, the suburban thug is actually a realization. You wouldn’t be able to tell based on CH3’s gangster narratives that the turf sits in the white picket fences of the American dream. The ambiguity between inner city and suburban life isn’t clarified enough and you begin to wonder, aside from the contrast in population density, are the two really that much different?

The most exciting moments on CH3 are the Young Buck assisted, Kingpin and Work. Buck, a G-Unit veteran, brings much needed energy that kills the monotony of Cashis’ drawn out, codiene-flow. Unfortunately, features that include, Mac Lucci, Project Pat, Sullee, Roscoe, Britizen Kane, and even a producer credit from Eminem on Thug Boydoesn’t do enough to salvage CH3. Cashis’ raps get drowned in melancholies and there isn’t enough variation in his voice or the tracks produced by Rikanatti to combat the album’s overwhelming gloom.

CH3 isn’t for everybody. It was made for Cashis’ core fan base – the people who’ve been there supporting him from the beginning.  There is much to be respected about an emcee who has made their own way and has successfully capitalized off the online market.  Although Cashis’ CH3 falls short it leaves you respecting the hustle, not necessarily the music.

Download CH3 here https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/the-county-hound-3/id976258748

© Copyright Eddie Savoy Bailey III, 2015

Written by: Eddie Bailey of The Savoy Media Group

Twitter @SavoyMediaGroup

Email: writingbattleraphistory@gmail.com

Blog: writingbattleraphistory.wordpress.com

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Wale | The Album About Nothing | #AlbumReview #TAAN

Saturday, April 4th, 2015

by Writing Battle Rap History

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(Photo via Complex Magazine)

(Photo via Complex Magazine)

Album Rating System 3 1/2 out of 5 records

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Listening to Wale rant and rave about how he doesn’t get the respect he deserves can be exhausting and off-putting. Because of that I’ve never cared to listen to a Wale album. I decided to give him a chance after reading an excerpt from his Billboard interview of him talking about being dissed by Katy Perry and how he should be spoken about in the same vain as Kendrick Lamar and J. Cole, after all, when you compare yourself to one of the two best emcees in Hip Hop you have to live up to that comparison.

In his fourth studio album, The Album About Nothing, inspired by the NBC hit sitcom, Seinfeld (the show about nothing), Wale partners with friend and star of the show, Jerry Seinfeld, who serves as a narrator and voice of reason on this accidental concept album. Yes, accidental. I don’t think Wale meant to write a concept album since the album is supposed to be about nothing, and I’m not sold on this being a clever nod to the situational irony in Seinfeld that made the show so popular, but in an ironic twist, TAAN is an album about everything.

Wale

Wale

Everything in Wale’s world are the powers-that-be opposing his success and how delusional the entertainment world is. If you think of VH1’s Love & Hip-Hop series you can imagine how Hip-Hop has created an illusory world where all of your dreams can come true with little work ethic, little talent, yet have an abundance of good looks and swag. This is Wale’s world, the world he’s disgusted with and addicted to simultaneously. This is apparent in The Glass Egg featuring an uncredited Chrisette Michelle, where he raps, “It’s right, it’ like life is like a glass egg/Tryna maintain what come with the fame and keeping your last friends/Yeah, you know that balance of/Cause who on your back or who got your back/I promise the line is this thin…”

Most of the production on TAAN is from producers I’m not familiar with but who laid out some well-produced tracks for Wale. For example, The Girls On Drugs, produced by No Credit, is an acid-laced track that samples Janet Jackson’s Go Deep and is the perfect illustrator of what the drug-induced, sex-filled nights are in the industry. This is a part of life that he’s all too familiar with. Once the wave of MDMA and lean surfaces, Wale’s ability to navigate between the make-believe extravagancy of the Hip-Hop world and real life solidifies him as a veteran. Reverting back to the classic boom bap sound, The Success is a track that takes samples from The Andrews Chapel United Methodist Young Adult Choir’s 1985 record, Psalms 121. Other songs worth checking out are The One Time In HoustonThe BloomThe White Shoes, and The Need To Know.

Interestingly enough, the song that doesn’t seem to fit on this album is the lead single, The Body, featuring Jeremih. I understand that it’s radio-friendly but how TAAN is structured, The Body as the last song is a mistake. TAAN could’ve ended with The Matrimony, featuring Usher and it would’ve been more befitting of TAAN’s storyline. It’s a better choice because in TAAN Wale confesses, I believe on more than one occasion, that he wants to settle down but has uncertainties, and in The Matrimony he finally comes full circle. Then it ends with The Body where he’s talking about sex with no strings attached. Doesn’t make much sense to me.

Admittedly, the Washington D.C. native has come very far in his career, especially, coming from a town that isn’t known for any top-tier Hip-Hop acts. No slight to emcees like Nonchalant, Question Mark Asylum, Fat Trel, or any other D.C. native, it’s just that historically, D.C. has been a tough market for emcees to breakout. Attending Howard University in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, I can attest to the fact that D.C. is an acquired taste – this goes for the layout of the city, Go-Go music, the people, and their sense of fashion. This is no different in the case of Wale. Like the city he reps, he grows on you and you learn to appreciate his quirks for what they are.

My first experience with Wale wasn’t bad at all. Wale is a niche artist that has the potential to have stronger star power if he just stayed in his lane. His angst to be praised as he thinks he should only shadows his appeal. Respectfully, his comparisons to K. Dot and J. Cole are a reach. Unlike To Pimp A Butterfly and 2014 Forest Hills Drive, TAAN lacks courage. TAAN is a solid piece of work but it’s a formulaic album that doesn’t stay etched in your memory bank.  It doesn’t push the limits of what Hip-Hop can be, it’s just a good album, and with an album with that kind of title you have to wow people.  TAAN also loses perspective, mainly, because Wale talks too much about himself. Instead of sticking with the irony of an industry that looks like an oasis only to find that in reality it is a deserted wasteland of hopes and dreams, it’s an album about how this oasis has left him high and dry and it’s the same recycled story that we’ve been hearing from Wale time and time again.

Download TAAN here https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/the-album-about-nothing/id972747051

© Copyright Eddie Savoy Bailey III, 2015

Written by: Eddie Bailey of The Savoy Media Group

Twitter @SavoyMediaGroup

Email: writingbattleraphistory@gmail.com

Blog: writingbattleraphistory.wordpress.com

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Kendrick Lamar | #ToPimpAButterfly #AlbumReview

Friday, March 20th, 2015

by Writing Battle Rap History

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To Pimp a Butterfly album cover

To Pimp a Butterfly album cover

Album Rating System:  5 out of 5 records

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This dick ain’t free,” is a gender bending, emphatic statement, that should be the mantra for black male youth growing up in a hyper-sexual society, where Kendrick Lamar redefines black masculinity on “For Free,” the second track on his second studio album, To Pimp A Butterfly. I don’t know if redefining black masculinity is on purpose or if it is by virtue of his conscious subject matter, but in TPAB Kendrick tackles social issues of the hood – manhood, love, sex, religion, mental illness, self-esteem and gang-banging, with a stream of effortless maturity. Either way – damn, this album is a breath of fresh air!

Kendrick’s maturity is not only a by-product of his upbringing but also of his spirituality. If you were to put a mirror up to the new faces of Christianity those faces may have a different look, especially with regard to perspective. It’s a perspective that is as simple as Kendrick talking about self love in “i” but as complicated as loving and hating the same person in “u”, or how he can be enraged and want to unify the black community at the same time in “The Blacker the Berry.” This may seem like truckload of contradictions but it is actually an honest and transparent look at what a human being looks like.

King Kendrick

King Kendrick

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m sure if we examined Kendrick’s heart among all the brilliant things there would be to study love would stand out. This kid’s heart is massively suffocating. He possesses a true love for black people, especially his Compton family. Though on the outset he abhors his homies’ gangster lifestyle, his affections for them are made clear on his album cover – Kendrick loves his niggas and truly wants to see them do well. The same love and respect he has for his homies he has for women, too. In “Complexion” he raps “Beauty is what you make it, I used to be so mistaken/By different shades of faces/Then wit told me, “A woman is woman, love the creation”/It all came from God then you was my conformation/I came to where you reside/And looked around to see sights for sore eyes/Let the Willie Lynch theory reverse a million times with…”

If I didn’t know any better the production on the TPAB sounded like Dr. Dre was operating in the spirit of Rico Wade, 1/3 of the Atlanta production team Organized Noize who produced albums for OutKast and Goodie Mob. This isn’t a slight to Dre, as I think this is arguably some of his best work to date, but the funk-jazz infused Hip Hop is sonically similar to Aquemini. The main difference in the production is the use of Be Bop jazz interpolations dispersed throughout TPAB in arrythmic patterns that plays up the coffee shop poetry feel. And of course, in Dr. Dre fashion, he tells a lengthy story that connects every song together in perfect succession.

The last song “Mortal Man” sums up the album. “Mortal Man” is riveting because toward the end of the song Kendrick has a conversation with Tupac Shakur, posthumously, of course, but carefully using excerpts of Tupac’s interviews creates a chilling dialogue between the two. After the two share their outlooks on life Kendrick pulls out a poem he wants to read to ‘Pac about the metaphor of the caterpillar and the butterfly. He explains it beautifully and then asks for ’Pac’s perspective, to which Pac doesn’t answer. The album ends with Kendrick saying, “Pac! Pac! Pac!” Some may see this as Kendrick being a Tupac incarnate but I think that Kendrick’s ideas on black emancipation are a bit more mature than Tupac’s. Tupac’s warrior-like passion is rooted in a kill-or-be-killed mentality, whereas Kendrick’s passions are rooted more in his love for God. If anything Kendrick Lamar is an evolved Tupac, and Pac’s silence is a clear indication that the torch has been passed.

TPAB download here —-> https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/to-pimp-a-butterfly/id974187289

© Copyright Eddie Savoy Bailey III, 2015

Written by: Eddie Bailey of The Savoy Media Group

Twitter @SavoyMediaGroup

Email: writingbattleraphistory@gmail.com

Blog: writingbattleraphistory.wordpress.com

#WBRH

Amerigo Gazaway Presents – Yasiin Gaye: The Return (Side Two) #AlbumReview

Thursday, June 12th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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YG Side 2 Cover Art

YG Side 2 Cover Art

Album Rating System 4 out of 5 records

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The marquis outside of 10 East 60th street in Manhattan reads “A night at the Copa with Yasiin Gaye.” Out with the Rat Pack crowd, with their black and white tuxes and Mafioso-DAs, and in with the black crowd.   It’s black night at the Copa and they’re here to support brother Yasiin. Conks, fried-dyed-and-laid-to-the-side, old-fashioneds and dirty martinis – impeccably dressed men and women with thick-framed glasses, skinny ties and cocktail dresses fill up the seats to the rafters. The headliner, Yasiin Gaye steps on stage into the spotlight in a midnight blue shark skinned suit and the show begins.

Though Yasiin was never at the Copa – only as I have imagined he would be in this write-up – he effortlessly brings you the elegance of that time period.  Yasiin Bey formerly known as Mos Def brings us Side Two, of his second installment of his mash-up with the late Marvin Gaye. Marvin’s legendary Motown catalogue is reconstructed in an eclectic composition that mixes funk, soul, blues, rock and hip hop. The album itself is an imaginative, cross-generational period piece that meets Marvin Gaye and Yasiin Bey at the crossroads of Bey’s nostalgia and the after life. Yasiin is sort of a Marvin Gaye incarnate.  He brings to life – if but for a moment  – Marvin Gaye and everything in the 60s-70s time capsule, in a surreal way.  Click here to read the full review.

 

Nitty Scott, MC #TheArtOfChill #AlbumReview

Friday, May 30th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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TAOC Cover Art

TAOC Cover Art

Album Rating System 4 out of 5 records

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Imagine a cramped Brooklyn apartment walk-up – say in Bushwick, filled with Egyptian musk incense competing with clouds of kush.  A cipher of gods and goddesses building, amongst decorated Turkish pillows and Ottoman poufs, and at the center sits the lotus flower.  Nitty Scott, MC.

Scott’s debut studio album, TAOC is suspended in irony.  On the surface the album title embodies the vanguard of everything that is cool, while the subject matter is everything but.  Scott’s journey of self-discovery and her confrontation of her past with sexual abuse is periling, but her youthful charm makes her plight all the more admirable.

In the intro, Wanderlust, which features sitarist, Rajib Karmakar, is a gently plucked embrace of Scott’s retreat to Eastern philosophy.  From the start you can envision the direction she’s headed, and it only gets better.

Nitty Scott, MC

Nitty Scott, MC

Behind the exterior is a ferocious MC and someone who has reverence for the craft.  In each song she carefully paragraphs her verses in expressive measure.  I’m talking about bars!  Meaningful content.  No filler.  No wasted space.

In Apex, featuring TDE artist, Ab-Soul, she spits in multi-syllabic fashion, “More dread from warheads/They want the poor dead, but I fed the universe on my forehead/And did this happen beforehand?/Now face it, they just basically erasing them glitches up in the matrix/Always thought the term Black Magic was kinda racist/And I have yet to find intelligent basis for the hatred/Attracting and deflecting a core of my star portals/Ain’t it gorgeous to be mortal?/I couldn’t be more cordial.” Click here to read the full review.

 

“…And Then You Shoot Your Cousin”: Album Review

Saturday, May 24th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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ATYSYC artwork

ATYSYC artwork

Album Rating System 3 1/2 out of 5 records

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You can never really wrap your mind around creativity.  Maybe because its not meant to be fully understood as opposed to being appreciated.  But then, when creativity meets social awareness it becomes a statement.  The Roots eleventh studio album,  & Then You Shoot Your Cousin, is an intellectual posit of Hip-Hop’s downward spiral.  It bleeds outside of mainstream music’s “assembly line” context, into a satirical look at millennial-Hip Hop’s nonsensical culture of debauchery and violence, and their relation to it.

The album starts off with a Nina Simone performance from Theme From The Middle Of The Night, with other complimenting interludes from jazz pianist, Mary Lou Williams, and French composer, Michel Chion, peppered throughout the album.

Black Thought, as usual, leads the vocals with his raspy, educated rap.  This time he brings along MCs, Greg Porn and Dice Raw to accompany his revolutionary conquests.

Thought raps in The Dark (Trinity), “The law of gravity meets the law of averages/Ain’t no sense in attempting to civilize savages/Even though I wish I could be spared my embarrassment/I’m a nxgga, other nxggas pale in comparison/We out in Paris yet but still a nxgga perishing/No idea how much time’s left, fxck trying to cherish it/A life in times unchecked, now that’s American/Inherit the wind, pressure in everything.”  Click here to read the full review.

 

Dr. Combs

Monday, May 12th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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Sean "P. Diddy" Combs

Sean “P. Diddy” Combs

Dr. Sean Combs, also known as “P.Diddy,” “Puff Daddy”, and “Big Homie,” among other names, had the honor of gracing the 2014 graduates of Howard University with the 146th Commencement Speech.  He was honored by the university for the degree of Doctor of Humanities.  There was quite a bit of controversy surrounding him being selected since he is a college dropout, and let’s be honest, because of who he is.

Combs is in no way refined in the pursuit of his ambitions, nor does he exercise subtlety in flaunting his riches.  Every thing he does is big.  I’m sorry – everything he does is grandiose; larger than life.  Combs has no chill button and that kind of personality makes some people uncomfortable, especially someone who isn’t the most polished piece of silverware in the bunch.

Howard University has had a rough year financially.  Former president, Sidney A. Ribeau suddenly stepped down last December after the university’s enrollment and credit score fell significantly under his leadership.  The Howard board of trustees appointed interim president, Wayne A.I. Frederick in Ribeau’s place.  The university announcing Combs as the commencement speaker in April was one of Frederick’s  decisions that pumped new life into the school.

Combs as the key note speaker is a sign of the times and a paradigm shift for colleges on who they deem worthy for the position.  Combs amassed his $700 million dollar fortune in an unconventional way, mostly through Hip-Hop.  And though many of us love Hip-Hop, we love it when its in its place – rooted in it’s foundational elements, not when a genre that is still considered parvenu is being honored for its scholastic achievements.

Notwithstanding the backlash, Combs gave a memorable speech.  He seemed a little out of his element and at times overly expressive in his gratitude, but that’s probably because he sincerely wanted to be accepted from the students and faculty as an honorable collegiate.

What I appreciated most about the speech was that it wasn’t coated with fancy language or presented like an essay, it was just straight talk in a way that only Diddy could deliver it.  Wrapping up his speech, Combs profoundly details his early days at Uptown Records, when then founder, Andre Harrell fired a young Combs because he got too cocky.  He was left without a job, an 8 1/2 month pregnant girlfriend, and a new home he purchased in Scarsdale, New York that he couldn’t afford.  Click here to read the full article.

 

Billionaire Beats

Friday, May 9th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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Dr. Dre & Jimmy Iovine

Dr. Dre & Jimmy Iovine

Dr. Dre may become Hip Hop’s first billionaire.  According to Gizmodo, as soon as next week Apple, Inc. may announce to the public it’s largest acquisition in the company’s history, a $3.2 billion dollar purchase of Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine’s, Beats Electronics headphones.  Forbes Magazine recently listed the top five Hip Hop moguls who had the highest net worths, and Dr. Dre came in at number two just under Sean Combs, at an estimated $550 million dollar net worth.  This deal would only add to his fortune as he is slated to make 1 billion dollars out of the deal.  Click here to read the rest of this article.

At the Top of Mt. Olympus

Friday, May 9th, 2014

by Writing Battle Rap History

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Big Krit

Big Krit

Mt. Olympus” is the funky ride to the galaxy of Cadillactica, Big K.R.I.T.’s forthcoming studio album.  K.R.I.T. is Ole Miss’ pride and joy,  magnolia tree-gravitas and all, he graciously stakes his claim as being a cut above the rest in “Mt. Olympus.”  It’s becoming more common for rappers to either refer to themselves as God, or in K.R.I.T.’s case, refer to his stature in Hip-Hop as being god-like.  Southerners rarely make those kinds of bold assertions when it comes to anything closely related to higher powers.  Growing up in the south old folks are quick to tell you that God will not be mocked, but K.R.I.T. is more concerned with being respected for having lyrical muscle, rather than being seen as the run of the mill, molly-popping, turn-up rapper.   Click here to read the full article.

Hip-Hop’s Purchasing Power

Tuesday, May 6th, 2014

by Writing Battle History

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Donald Sterling - Los Angeles Clippers franchise owner

Donald Sterling – Los Angeles Clippers franchise owner

The Donald Sterling ordeal was something else!  After being surreptitiously recorded ranting his feelings about black people to his mistress, V. Stiviano, Sterling’s appallingly primitive views on race set in motion a tidal wave of disgust throughout the national media.   The width of his racism was captured in his infamous quotes.  Speaking of his black players, “I support them and give them food, and clothes, and cars, and houses.”  He continues, “I’m just saying, in your lousy fxxxing Instagrams, you don’t have to have yourself walking with black people,” and “Don’t put him [Magic Johnson] on an Instagram for the world to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games.”

Though Stiviano is racially mixed, post-racial America’s charge on a boldly different perspective on race and race relations hasn’t capitulated Sterling’s D.W. Griffith-aesthetic.  Because of this, NBA Commissioner, Adam Silver fined Sterling $2.5 million dollars in addition to banning him from the NBA “for life.” Among more interesting things is that the NBA is taking action to force Sterling to sell his $575 million dollar franchise, that could sell for upwards of $1 billion dollars.  There are plenty of sharks roaming the shores of the LA Clippers’ franchise; filthy rich sharks, and some famed rappers are a part of this pod.

If the NBA’s board of governors can force Sterling to sell, a roll call of potential buyers are ready.  With a combined net worth of over $60 billion dollars, the most likely to win a bidding war are business tycoons Oprah Winfrey, David Geffen and Larry Ellison.  Guggenheim Partners, Magic Johnson, and Mark Walter are another group of bidders that have a good shot at the LA Clippers.  The sharks that are least likely to win in a bidding war are rappers. Sean Combs, Dr. Dre, and Rick Ross have all publicly expressed interest but compared to the above mentioned, probably lack the capital needed to purchase a majority stake.

They can afford to be minority owners, however.  Nelly is a minority owner of the Charlotte Bobcats and Jay-Z recently sold his minority stake in the Brooklyn Nets.  And Drake has partnered with his hometown team, the Toronto Raptors, helping them with a variety of initiatives, including launching a clothing line in conjunction with the franchise.  Click here to read the full article.