The Good:
Cyhi The Prynce - Hystori: Black History Project
Cyhi The Prynce is so commonly recognized as the most underrated G.O.O.D. Music artist that it's easy to forget he deserves more recognition. If he's getting recognition on the message boards, isn't that enough?
Then you listen to the latest Cyhi project and you remember that he's low-key one of the best rappers in the game and deserves to be treated like one.
Hystori is largely a socially conscious album that pays tribute to great African Americans that helped pave the way for men like Cyhi. What's interesting is that he seems to pay tribute to actual activists through song titles while mimicking black musicians through the production, which was overseen by Mr. G.O.O.D. Music himself, Kanye West.
This can be heard as soon as the first track, "Huey," starts, which sounds like Yeezy got to Hova's "Hard Knock Life." In the song, Cyhi sounds an awful lot like Kanye, especially when he delivers the slightly egotistical bars that you can't even be mad at because they're kinda true, like "So next time you say, 'The A' got no lyricists' / I just think you gotta taste this exquisite shit." Plus, everyone's favorite Chicago gangster, King Louie (they call him Tony), comes through for a downright dirty verse.
"Basquiat" is another clear allusion to black art, both in the physical sense and the musical sense. The beat samples "It Takes Two" by Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock while the lyrics pay tribute to the artistic integrity of graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. It's an interesting combination and it might be meant to show the difference between the two sides of art. What's really mind-blowing--if it's intentional, that is--is that Basquiat died in 1988, the same year "It Takes Two" was released. Cyhi is a clever rapper, but he's taking it to a whole new level on this one.
Cyhi didn't forget about his ancestors, either, as shown on "Mandela," where The Prince raps over African tribal drums in honor of the late South African activist.
Ultimately, Cyhi compares himself to some of these great activists and musicians. Sure, on paper that sounds like a bit much. But when listening to Hystori, it seems completely feasible. And with Cyhi's first actual album currently in the works, Hystori is just the beginning.
Cyhi The Prynce is so commonly recognized as the most underrated G.O.O.D. Music artist that it's easy to forget he deserves more recognition. If he's getting recognition on the message boards, isn't that enough?
Then you listen to the latest Cyhi project and you remember that he's low-key one of the best rappers in the game and deserves to be treated like one.
Hystori is largely a socially conscious album that pays tribute to great African Americans that helped pave the way for men like Cyhi. What's interesting is that he seems to pay tribute to actual activists through song titles while mimicking black musicians through the production, which was overseen by Mr. G.O.O.D. Music himself, Kanye West.
This can be heard as soon as the first track, "Huey," starts, which sounds like Yeezy got to Hova's "Hard Knock Life." In the song, Cyhi sounds an awful lot like Kanye, especially when he delivers the slightly egotistical bars that you can't even be mad at because they're kinda true, like "So next time you say, 'The A' got no lyricists' / I just think you gotta taste this exquisite shit." Plus, everyone's favorite Chicago gangster, King Louie (they call him Tony), comes through for a downright dirty verse."Basquiat" is another clear allusion to black art, both in the physical sense and the musical sense. The beat samples "It Takes Two" by Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock while the lyrics pay tribute to the artistic integrity of graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. It's an interesting combination and it might be meant to show the difference between the two sides of art. What's really mind-blowing--if it's intentional, that is--is that Basquiat died in 1988, the same year "It Takes Two" was released. Cyhi is a clever rapper, but he's taking it to a whole new level on this one.
Cyhi didn't forget about his ancestors, either, as shown on "Mandela," where The Prince raps over African tribal drums in honor of the late South African activist.
Ultimately, Cyhi compares himself to some of these great activists and musicians. Sure, on paper that sounds like a bit much. But when listening to Hystori, it seems completely feasible. And with Cyhi's first actual album currently in the works, Hystori is just the beginning.
The BadPharrell:
Kendrick Lamer, Miley Cyrus, Robin Thicke, Sir Michael Rocks, Asher Roth, Casey Veggies and Freddie Gibbs. What do all these artists have in common? They all probably owe some favor to Pharrell and decided to pay him back by being featured on Buddy's debut mixtape.
That's right--the Compton native is lucky enough to have this all-star lineup on his first ever mixtape. How, you ask? He probably sold his soul to Pharrell. But if Pharrell has taught as anything, it's that being able to work with the Neptune is much more rewarding than any soul.
What's even crazier than the list of features is how long Idle Time has been in the works. Pharrell's little Buddy has been working on this mixtape for over three years. If only Pharrell spent that much time on his hat choices. HEYO! Pop culture references!
That being said, every year was well worth it. Smokey the Bear was able to craft a pop rap masterpiece for Buddy, and that should be huge as the West Coast rapper goes forward.
However, that doesn't mean this is good actual rap. Don't get me wrong, I love Pharrell and couldn't be happier that he has become one of the most influential people in the music industry. But, he's come a long way from the mastermind behind some of hip-hop's biggest acts and has since drifted heavily into Billboard Top 100 territory.
That's all good for Pharrell & Co., but when listening to an artist like Cyhi The Prince right before Buddy, Idle Time seems much too shallow.
"Smoke Signals," which is produced by Pharrell and features Miley, is an extremely catchy song that properly layers the Queen of Twerk underneath Buddy's vocals to give the song a bit of a soulful feel. However, when getting down to it, it's just about getting high with a girl.
These problems become even more evident when Buddy is put side-by-side with hip-hop elites like Lamar and Sir Michael.
"Agitated," which is especially notable for the Cool Kids reunion between Sir Michael and producer Chuck Inglish, just makes Buddy look foolish. While Buddy's rhyming with repetition, Michael has consecutive bars with the same rhyme scheme without repeating himself once.
And Kendrick's verse on "Staircases" makes the metaphors in Buddy's verse seem like it was written by a child. Hell, Kendrick even spells out his usage of metaphors when he raps, "This rapping's just a metaphor and I deserve a medal for / Writing another metaphor, about ambition," and even that is more complex than Buddy. Lonely Island was a better fit for Kendrick than this youngin'.
Idle Time accomplishes exactly what it wanted: to be catchy without much effort. And the large amount of features is enough to make the mixtape tolerable. But ultimately, this is more pop than rap, which isn't what hip-hop mixtapes are all about.
The Re-dic-yu-lus:
Here's a list of things this mixtape does right:
1. Uses the term "scrilla."
And that's it. I don't know why, but I've always just really liked the term "scrilla" to describe money. Same with "guap." I should really start using them more...
Sorry, I was just trying to distract myself from the actual mixtape, Scrilla Season. Good title, bad content.
One of the things that annoys me most about Money EDD (is it "Ee Dee Dee" or "Ed?") is that he thinks a hook just has to be one semi-cool sounding sentence repeated consistently. This seems to be a problem with a lot of rappers these days, but Double Dee over here takes this to an extreme. Actually, scratch that. He's not Double Dee. If he's anyone from Ed, Edd & Eddy, it's definitely Eddy. He even kind of looks like him.
Ha! Look at that! I was kind of kidding but he actually does kind of look like an older Eddy. Even the big ears. Now EDDy has done two things right with Scrilla Season.
Sorry, I have ADD when it comes to EDD. Hot damn, I'm on a roll. But back to this whole screaming a shitty hook thing. "Floating" is a good example of this. The hook switches off between "I'm riding around witchyo girl" and one line where EDDy just sings really horribly. And then the verse starts and, to his credit, EDDy does manage some semi-decent rhymes. However, the quality is so subpar and the annoying phaser synth beat can really get on a writer's nerves.
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| Looking back, this looks kinda weird |
And actually, doesn't this whole mixtape kind of look like something Eddy would do? I could just imagine him asking Double Dee to help out with production, but then he'd refuse, so Eddy would go to Ed, but he would do such a bad job that Double Dee would have to step in. And then they'd try to sell it to get jaw breakers, but no one would buy it. Poor Eddy.
Listening to this production, it sounds much more Ed than Double Dee. The beats are usually just a collection of boring synths or overly simple instrumentation. There's also a large amount of really stupid Auto-Tune that this writer can't stand.
Actually, the more I think about this, the more I realize this mixtape is worse than anything the Eds could come up with. Even Plank could do a better job at a mixtape than EDD. Sorry, EDD, but you're not making any scrilla off Scrilla Season. No jaw breakers for you.
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