By KEVIN JACOB
Staff Writer
Welcome all to another week of Kickin It with KJ. I know I’ve been absent the past couple of weeks but I’m back at it with some new reviews for everyone. This week I’ll be going over a couple of mixtapes, a few albums, and everything in between. Let’s get into it.
Lil Durk – Signed To The Streets –
I’ve got a good friend of mine who’s pretty up on Chicago’s own Lil Durk. I like Lil Durk and he’s got some crazy songs such as “L’s Anthem” so I thought I would check it out after hearing “Don’t Understand Me,” which I heard at my boy’s house. The mixtape is pretty solid. Durk is one of the better Chicago rappers that’s been doing it recently and this mixtape shows a lot of growth and versatility from Durk. “Bang Bros” and “Traumatized” show Durk using a Singing/Rapping technique with vocoder. Most of the tracks are like this but on “52 Bars Part 2.” Durk has some of his best raps on the project. He’s not very lyrical but if you’re trying to just turn up and let loose ,then Signed To The Streets is definitely for you.
Rating: 7/10
Doley Bernays – Just in Case–
I learned about up and coming Bronx rapper Doley Bernays scrolling through some internet article the other day. The article intrigued me so I thought I would check out his Just in Case EP. To my surprise I thought that the EP was probably one of the best projects I’ve heard all year. No lie. Doley raps with something that many of today’s artists lack-passion. You can hear the pain in this kid’s voice and it’s pretty gripping. With tales involving lust, drugs, violence, family problems, and more drugs, this project may sound a bit one dimensional but it’s far from it. What help’s Doley’s case is that he has fantastic production. Songs like “We belong here”, “Till We Fall”, and “Bad Guy,” all are well layered and they sound like they were created when a dream of yours turns into a nightmare. The best song on this project for me has to be “Raise Your Weapon”. Bernays spits a double time flow that is pretty fire and the vocal sample, which I’ve heard is a DeadMau5 sample fits the song and overall theme of the project great. Give this EP a chance. I’ve got a feeling about Doley Bernays in the future.
Rating: 9.5/10
Eminem – Marshall Mathers LP 2 –
Eminem is back with his new album MMPL2 and your boy thought that technically, it was amazing. Eminem is a rap icon and has proven time and time again that he can rap his a%$ off. “Rap God”, “Bad Guy” and even “So Much Better.” When it comes to rapping little, it can come close to Marshall Mathers. I’m not going to lie to you though. While there are some really great tracks on here there is some bull**** on here as well. “Monster” with Rhianna is a terrible song and other songs such as “Survival,” and “Stronger Then I was” aren’t much better. I don’t blame Eminem for making some songs like this because he has to, to appeal to the mainstream audiences who consume music like this (no disrespect to the mainstream music audience). Even on these tracks the rapping is good but a huge problem I’ve got with this album is the beats. I don’t even know where to start. Although “Rap God” is good at nearly six minutes long that sort of pop/techno beat gets old QUICK. Same thing happens on “So Far” which has a good idea of chopping “Life’s Been Good” by Joe Walsh but it’s done terribly and sounds completely out of place on this album. The one song that I heard has been getting a lot of hack off of this LP is “Love Game” featuring Kendrick Lamar and I have no idea why. Both Eminem and Kendrick spazz on this. Sure, is it the hardcore all out rap anthem that people were thinking of when they heard they were going to collaborate? No. But it serves as fun song that happens to include a lot of great rapping and storytelling ability. “Love Game” might be my favorite song on the whole album.
While on my first time listening I really didn’t like the album…..but after giving it a few spins it really does start to grow on you. Especially “Bezerk” which I had pure hatred for when it came out. I blame my increasing likeness of Bezerk in thanks to those ESPN Commercials. (Touché Disney). If you can get past some of the obvious crap that’s on here there are more then a couple songs on here that will remind you why Eminem is one of the best rappers to ever do it.
Rating: 8/10
That’s all for this week of Kickin It with KJ. I’ll be back writing for at least a few more weeks as there is supposed to be a lot of quality music dropping. Keep listening.
