I agree- I seriously thought the beat for Have Mercy sounded familiar. Perhaps both tracks sample the same song?

Nuggets like these make reading blog comments worthwhile. That might be my favorite moment on the album. Just to give Jeff something to disagree about or groan over, a quasi-similar line (to the Bill Clinton line quoted above) that I’ve always loved since I’ve heard it is Master P’s “Bill Clinton be the President/but bitch I don’t care about that, I’m on the corner trying to represent!”

Ha! I guess you’re right. I can hate with the best of them! But really when’s the last time an album came out that pretty much everyone agreed was good? I mean, I cant ever remember anyone saying: “I dont know about “The Chronic”, the hi hat on track #7 should have been louder”. Has there even been a real bonafide undisputed classic hiphop album in the last 5 years? The music can’t be that bad nowadays can it?

“The point of these posts is mostly to highlight the awesome little details that would be lost in your average review, not tear the thing apart piece by piece.”

I think one of the more memorable lines is the “moved in next to Bill Clinton’s mother cause she fucks with the Chinese”. I have no idea why he would say that but now I can’t stop saying it myself. On the last Noisemakers with Peter Rosenberg he asked Rae why he shouted out Conneticut on “Incarcerated Scarfaces”. Rae responded by saying “I felt like I just needed a state right there”. I think that same type of random writing process is also present throughout this album.

Ultimately, I think this record is the most enjoyable Hip-Hop album I’ve heard in yearsr. The point of these posts is mostly to highlight the awesome little details that would be lost in your average review, not tear the thing apart piece by piece.

Yeah. It’s funny how people are willing to accept over the top street tales from a 25 year old, but not a 40 year old. What’s the difference? What happened to creative liscence? I’m not saying that Rae isn’t a street dude. But anyone that thinks everything him & Ghost were spitting on the original Cuban Linx was word for word real is an idiot. Mabey it was stuff they heard about second hand, some may have been made up completely, and some they may have actually lived through. I don’t see how the source of inspiration can detract from the listening experience though. With all due respect, Brandon’s review seemed a little weak to me. Sounds like he just doesn’t like it. Which makes alot more sense than the “these guys are almost 40″ argument.

I think this extends to the rapping as well, and Brandon is right both about the Lox and Beanie not really belonging and Rae (and Ghost) not doing (them/)himself justice. This is a solid record with great moments that I think could have been great across the board, but was missing somebody to be Supreme Clientele-era RZA (and fuck is it sad that the RZA will probably never again be able to do that. Kung-Fu directing Funny Peopling Digi-Snacks Afro-Samurai’d Chamber-Musicing motherfucker is the definition of unfocused). The skits don’t push the record forward, they just sort of tick off the appropriate Wu boxes (notable exceptions being the “Langston” moment, “Pyrex Visions,” the end of “Gihad”). Something like the “blue and cream” bit, or the Meth/Rae interplay about the Killer tape, or “Woodrow the Basehead” could have lifted this further by filling out the Cuban Linx world-either by showing another dimension or by detailing it really thoroughly. The kung-fu stuff, as Sach alluded to earlier, doesn’t really go with the record, the Ghost shit at the start of Penitentiary is a kind of sad cliché.

Rae does some interesting shit on this record, but I wish somebody was pushing him a little more. He spits flames, sure, but they’re red where they need to be purple.