Chesstown King's Reviews and Thoughts

Keri returns with a more bitter album than her debut. It’s a sound album, but you can’t but feel she could have done better here. As the title suggests she is mad @ men and don’t want No Boy…lol. The guest features are well used, but should have been spread out more. The album’s construction isn’t that great, but at the end you get a PG remix with Kanye. Overall though the album is good in that it is executed generally well. However I felt some of the concepts for some songs were a little half assed.     I give this album a 8.5/10.

Goodie Mob returns……where have they been? I mean Cee-Lo has been popular but….uh ok on to the review. This is a solid album with no real great weakness. What I also like is that the songs have meaning to them….Some may complain that there’s too much Cee-Lo here but he does a great job. The other 3 members aren’t bad either. Perhaps the worst thing about this album is the cover…it’s a tad bit strange. This is one album you don’t want to sleep on. Trust me.     I give this album a 9/10.

Drake’s 3 rd album is his best work yet. The album sounds incredibly well excuted. Also I noticed there’s not a huge guest list like on his first 2 albums. Drake is the star here, and isn’t really outshined by anyone except for maybe Jay-z on one song. The album gets off to a good start and doesn’t let up. Drake is a better lyricist this time around. Its not just about wordplay either: He’s varied his delivery here and it works. Started From the Bottom is an anthemic record. Hold On We’re Going Home reminds me of Find Your Love from his 1 st album, but its more uptempo. The beats on this album are also very good. The album has a whole lot of replayability but there are a couple songs at the end that don’t really help the album. Overall its nice to see Drizzy Drake progressing and making a 90+ album I knew he was capable of. Overall I give this album a 9.5/10......yea I know I gave this score to a lot of albums but this might be the year's best rap album.

Janelle/Cindy returns for her 2 nd full album. This album has a more traditional feel than the Arch Android, but it still showcases her talent. She strings together quality songs back to back with ease here. The album is really accessible with songs like Dance Apocalyptic and Q.U.E.E.N. The album has a nice guest list which includes Miguel, Erykah Badu, Solange, and even Prince. Janelle’s lyrics are excellent as they have been on past works. The beat selection is also very good. Complaint wise I think that some songs are just too generic like Look Into My Eyes or It’s Code. The skits are very good also. I feel that Suite V is more ballad based than the first Suite (IV). However the first part of the album features more uptempo songs. Overall I’d have to say this is one of the best R&B albums ever and maybe the best album of 2013 Overall its a 9.75/10 for me. Not perfect but great.

My Thoughts Volume VII   Welcome back to my blog. I want to apologize for changing my URL….it must be the reason I lost so many views. Well anyway please inform anyone you know that my blog is in fact still up. Let me get right into a few things….on this edition of “My Thoughts” I normally do music reviews so I will not mention much about that. For one, this has been a great year for R&B and RAP music. I’ve counted about 20 rap albums for this year alone. There’s been some good R&B albums as well this year already. I also cannot forget about the resurgence of Justin Timberlake. Eminem and Drake are looking to drop albums this year and I hope they are both at least a 9/10.   Movie wise I haven’t seen that many this year. I saw that one movie Hansel and Gretchen which was quite entertaining. Rewind back to January. I saw that movie A Haunted House with a friend. It was good. It fueled by sexual and racist humor. Iron Man 3 was a blockbuster movie. ...

The latest Big Sean album is a major improvement over his debut….the formula is about the same but everything seems less formulatic and better executed. After hearing Finally Famous back in 2011 I wasn’t too impressed with the Detroit rapper. He had a big guest list, and honestly he needed it. However this sophomore effort is better in every way. Its not all about the $$ and the girls this time. The rapper talks about the struggles of Detroit Michigan. His lyricism has gotten better but not a whole lot better. Big Sean chose some really dope beats for his album as well. “MILF” seems to be the best track, but there are a lot of stand out songs. There is a nice guest list including Common, Nas, Young Jeezy, Nicki Minaj, Juicy J, 2 Chainz, and Lil Wayne. The album also has high replayability and cohesiveness. Waaaaay waaaay! I give this album a 9/10. Its not perfect, but theres not many flaws here.