Chesstown King's Reviews and Thoughts

This is one debut album that doesn’t disappoint. Her greatest strength on this album is her vulnerability. She constantly sings about her weakness and desire to get with the opposite sex. My favorite songs are the opener with J.Cole and Oh What a Night. The album has nothing but exceptional songs, and great replayability. The beats are good but nothing stellar. I think this is the beginning of a long career. I give this album a 9.4/10.....its almost a 9.5 but not quite

Well it was only a matter of time before El-p and Killer Mike did an album together. The result is a really dope album. These two have incredible chemistry. The album has no technical weaknesses. My only real complaint is(like on El-P’s Cancer 4 Cure) that the subject matters are sometimes hard to pick up. El-P and Killer Mike lyrically destroy the futuristic beats. I like every song here. There’s not much of a guest list but Big Boi’s contribution on “Banana Clipper” is very good. With that said this album is candidate for album of the year.   I give this album a 9.5/10...good S***!

Game’s G-Unit debut is a great album. He raps with more intensity than he showed on other G-Unit soldiers albums. In fact this album is every bit as good as 50 Cent’s debut. The production is terrific also. 50 and Game have serious chemistry. Of course there’s lots of other guests like Tony Yayo(uhhh?), Floetry, Faith Evans,Nate Dogg, Mary J. Blige,Busta Rhymes, and the legendary Eminem. The album has a lot of great songs, but some like Runnin’ seem like filler. The song with Mary J. Blige, “Don’t Worry” is also pretty average. Looking back Game would only get better lyrically, as he rapped over weaker beats in the future. I give this album a 9.5/10.

Bieber comes back with a different album and a deeper voice. The album gets off to a really good start. Then it kind of slows down from there before picking up again at the end. The production is good, Bieber’s lyrics aren’t bad but not quite as clever as on My World 2.0. The guest spots which include Ludacris(big surprise), Nicki Minaj, Big Sean, and Drake are all well used. I really think that Justin Bieber will be around for a while….hes pretty talented. I give this album a 8.5/10.

-Banks’ debut album is a great one. First off his lyrics are really good. He raps sort of like Biggie Smalls….(The Notorious B.I.G.) with less energy sure, but whatever. The album is well constructed and it has some great flashy beats. It really reminds me of 50 Cent’s debut album but not quite on that level. On Fire, I’m So Fly, and Warrior Pt. 1 & 2 are elite songs. Karma is a nice love song. Most of the album is just really nice. A lot of people said 50 Cent wasn’t the best member of G-Unit; while that wasn’t true, Lloyd is a great G-Unit soldier   Overall I give this album a 9/10!

Well as you know the year is just over half over and I have been privileged to almost 20 rap albums already. If no more albums were to come out this is a list of who would make my annual top album of the year list. If the year were over today this would be the list. 1.       J.Cole: Born Sinner 2.       Kanye West: Yeezus 3.       Run the Jewels(Killer Mike & El-P):Run the Jewels 4.       Jay-z: Magna Carta Holy Grail 5.       Kid Cudi: Indicud 6.       Tech N9ne: Something Else 7.       Chance the Rapper: Acid Rap 8.       Wale: The Gifted 9.       Ghostface Killah: Twelve Reasons to Die 10.   Talib Kweli: Prisoner of Conscious The top 4 albums are actually tied(9.5/10). The bottom 3 are also tied. (9/10)

The Fall of 50 Cent   Well you may not know I am a huge 50 Cent fan. I am writing this to share my thoughts on how this great rapper Rose to the top and then fell. I am going to be brutally honest here as to what I think is going on with 50 Cent.   First let’s talk about the rise of Curtis Jackson. I’m not going to get into all the details, im not Wikipedia. Instead I will tell you from my point of view. 50 seemed to come out of nowhere with his big hit “Wanksta” in 2002. He also had a really nice track called “Places to Go” off the 8mile soundtrack. Sounds formulatic as to how a rapper gets popular right? Well you can’t really mention 50 without mentioning how he gets most of his attention; Starting BEEF.   As 50 Cent rose, NY rival Ja Rule went to becoming very unpopular in 2003. It got so bad that Ja Rule released a bitter album(That I believe helped seal his career’s fate) Ja would make a comeback album in 2004 called R.U.L.E. but this is about 50 not Ja.   50