you talk about that bread, but ya bread ain't buttered

so gully


Who knew that 2007 would be the year that The Roc returned? Kanye releases the biggest album of the year, Hov comes back strong after last year's album which shall not be discussed and Freeway's much anticipated sophomore effort (I have to post on this later) has been circulating on the internet for a bit now. I mean, even Bleek has had some new tracks leaking out, I didn't know Jay still let him put rhymes to tape. I have this image in my head of Hovie coming out of the booth or watching Beans tear through some bars and then letting Bleek have like five minutes of fun time in the booth, pretending to be a rapper.
Then there's Beanie Sigel. He's Free's mentor, he stood behind Jay after Dame and Cam'ron jumped ship (while still letting his unhappiness with Hov be felt) and he has been dropping verses for years, the best ones have always been when he's on that nervous/introspective/nostalgia tip.
Beans' last record, The B. Coming came out my senior year of high school to some pretty heavy critical praise. My feeling's on that album haven't changed much. It's half Beanie playing to his strengths and half a record of the man trying to catch a hit. He's never had that top 40 hit and that's the man's problem. He still wants it.
One of my favorite things about the new Freeway album is that he veers away from the club bangers for the most part and keeps things pretty gutter, which is where he sounds best.
Not that I want to blast Beans for wanting that commercial appeal but dude is not exactly going to be going up on any girl's wall sometime soon. His flow on The Solution has crept even closer to that of Scarface (who drops by for his usual solid bars) and Scar's style has not exactly translated into commercial rap success.
My favorite Beans track is still probably, Feel It in the Air, from The B. Coming. After my initial listens to The Solution there isn't a track that's touching that one's greatness. Feel It was about as paranoid as rap gets aside from Mind Playin' Tricks (my favorite rap song) and The Solution just feels kind of cookie cutter for Beanie. He does a good deal of boasting how he's not to be messed with, smokes good weed, drinks Patron (Diddy's even on the Patron song) and guns, the usual rap game fare.
You could definitely do worse than The Solution so far this year concerning rap releases, but Beans is better than this. I can't wait until he drops a classic, but for now I'll just pick and choose the bright spots from his releases.

Also, James Blunt is sampled on a track, at least I hope he's sampled and didn't actually provide the vocals. The Broad Street Bully and that wiener in the same room is worse than hip hop's infatuation with John Mayer.