Finally feel like I have given this enough spins to give this an honest, objective review. I've been anticipating this album for a while. Loved GKMC from jump, grew to love the greatness that was Section 80. So my expectations for this album was at an all time high. However I begin to get worried about the album as time passed and we got to about 2 years before finally being able to hear this thing. And the reason I worried is because I felt K.Dot might be trying to hard to make a masterpiece of an album. And unfortunately I feel like my worries came to friction.
Off jump, first listen, this album was pretty meh to me. After the first listen, which allowed my expectations to change towards the album, my feelings towards it got better. Gave it a few gym spins, a few car spins, and a few headphone spins and I feel like its a good album, but I don't think its worthy of all the critical acclaim that it is getting. But its going to get the critical acclaim because I think that is exactly what K.Dot was shooting for. The production is great, but I feel like its "safe" production for the casual and mainstream crowd. In fact I feel like the production of the album pretty much overshadows everything K.Dot says on the album, and his rapping almost feels force over some of the beats on the album. And while there is some value in being able to easily play a CD from track 1 to the end when you decide to listen to a CD, I think it also says something about the lack of standout tracks when you never feel the need to just skip to a song and listen to it. The only songs that come close to that for me is "How Much a Dollar Cost" and "Mortal Man" which leads me to the inclusion of the universally loved Tupac "interview" at the end of the album. Nice touch but I can't help but feel like it was another addition to the album to grab at the hearts of everyone to love this album.
Another issue for me, is for some reason, between GKMC up until now, K.Dot has just picked up this fraud type of vibe to me. How he acts so surprised at his success, how he supposedly expected everyone to take the Control verse as just rap, his psuedo militant raps, but then race friendly attitude in interviews, the ambigious Rolling Stones cover, his beef with Meek when he can/could've take on much bigger foes, and the fact he acts like there is no machine behind him. Despite being a fan of him as an artist dude has just been rubbing me the wrong way a lot between now and GKMC and I think it plays a part in regards to how I feel about the album. Because is this really the music dude wanted to make, or is this the music he made to get the critical acclaim/Grammy type of shyt that I think he seeks.
In the end I like the album, but I think its getting overrated. People tend to mistake something different for being something special and I think a lot of that is going on here. Album will continue to get spins from me here and there, but if I had to choose, I'd much rather listen to Section.80, GKMC before listening to this album.
"I ask the Pigs to step back, cuz I think I can get respect from my OWN PEOPLE" to "It shouldn't be shyt for us to come out her and appreciate the little bitt of life we get left, dawg": Them Dualities
