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| Doc J reviews: Ludacris - |
| Written by Administrator | Published Sun, 28 March 2010 |
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Ludacris, Shawna, Disturbing the Peace, Battle of the Sexes |
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Doc J's exclusive interview with AListRadio.net's next big DJ, A-Smooth as he shares tips, experiences & gets personal!
It’s Tuesday, June 8th…This is Doc J, representing Hear My Voice Ent, and I’m in the building with DJ A-Smooth, and we bringing you this audio interview straight from EP WORLDWIDE…Every Playa! Worldw
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Doc J's Music Insider Guide: ADVICE FROM MAJORS TO INDIES! - Part 2
SUGGESTIONS ABOUT THE BUSINESS SIDE. Whattup kiddos? During the last segment I covered advice from major label artists speaking on the type of mentality an artist should strive for, when trying to be successful. Once you get your mind right, an artist t
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Doc J's Music Insider Guide: ADVICE FROM MAJORS TO INDIES! - Part 1
A Profound Rationalization of Jesse Gissen’s April 2010 XXL article. This month XXL journalist, Jesse Gissen (who also shares my first name), briefly tou
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Every Playa! Worldwide's Doc J reviews: SLASH - SLASH
4.5 Stars out of 6: Above-Average Album, a good CD that while still containing a few flaws, it surprisingly has a lot of quality material and replay value.
While claiming to be a Hip-Hop collector and aficionado, Rock music is something I enjoy as well. While I’m not an avid Rock lis
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3 Stars out of 6: Average Album, basic run-of-the-mill CD taking little risks, typically what was expected  Contains hits but consistency and concept are an issue here. Has strong points and equal weaknesses; not bad, but not great either.
It’s been an age-old argument – boys vs. girls…adam vs. eve …machismo vs. feminism…men vs. women…venus vs. mars…penis vs. vagina - the list can go on and on. There are obvious differences between the wants of the two genders. Atlanta rap star, Ludacris, isn’t exactly known for his sensitivity towards women (see “You’z A Hoe”, “Area Codes”, and “Move Bitch”), but he tries to host a consortium between the two sides and point-of-views, on his seventh studio album, Battle of the Sexes. This project, which has been in the works since 2008, was originally intended to be a duet concept album between Ludacris and Shawnna. Back in May of 2009, Ludacris explained to MTV cameras that this CD would be the first fair pairing of the male-vs.-female perspectives on record, which has never been done before. Shawnna unfortunately left Disturbin’ the Peace, for T-Pain’s label, Nappy Boy Entertainment – mid-way through recording, prompting Luda to turn it into a solo album to still capitalize on it. To no surprise, a few of the saved vocals from Shawnna appear on various tracks, much like ghosts of what could have been. With only a male left to lead the debate, the concept’s view definitely took a different shape, but let’s sees what the end result is.
In traditional Luda fashion, as with all his other albums, we begin with a rapped “Intro”. This time around Ludacris [and “Do My ladies run this” chants from Shawnna] bless a quick running cymbal and chop-n-screwed beat, setting the stage by talking about how he parties and performs, with even a chant whether if MEN or WOMEN run this mother. This is followed respectively by the first and second single, “How Low” & “My Chick Bad”. The contagious high-energy “How Low” laced by Toronto, Canada's T-Minus, is an uber-radio-smash that slickly uses a sped-up Chuck D sample from “Bring Da Noise”, chorus vocals from Shawnna, and strip club-appeal lyrics from Luda. The Legendary Traxster’s-produced “My Chick Bad” has Ludacris describing exactly what a bad chick is; going head-to-head with new flavor of the month, Nicki Minaj–a good match for the animated rapper, in terms of her delivery and excitement. These are followed by the made-for-parties promotion single “Everybody Drunk” that was released way back in April 2009. This altered album version basically has Luda rhyming about being drunk as fuck, and replaces Shawnna with a new Lil Scrappy verse instead. Probably the best constructed song on this album is the string-powered and guitar-riffed “BOTS Radio”, which is similar to Jay-Z’s “1-900-Hustler” but instead of explaining the concept of selling drugs – Ludacris, Shawnna, & I-20 give advice on how to deal with jealous females, broke brothers, and booty call etiquette. The rumored 3rd single “My Chick Bad Remix” is another rare highlight here, where the females’ perspective is BEST represented with the features of Diamond, Trina, & Eve all on one track. Probably my favorite song here is unfortunately the bonus hidden track, “Sexting”. This ultra-bouncy, Neptunes-produced song is a hella-creatively humorous take on cell phone texting language and jokes on Tiger Wood’s cheating scandal.
Sadly, there were more mistakes than successes on Battle of the Sexes. I dunno if Shawnna jumping ship made Luda rush things, but there were awfully poor beat selections, generic concept choices, lazy choruses, and ineffective collaborations all over this CD. Probably the best example of all these flaws combined is the zap & synth-heavy, “Party No Mo”, featuring Gucci Mane. Not only does Gucci Mane underperform, as usual, but even Luda’s I-make-more-money-&-have-bigger-guns-than-you lyrics seem half-hearted and don’t fit the theme of this album. “I Know You Got a Man” is pretty catchy and I can see it being single-worthy with its playfully fun beat, but featured guest Flo-Rida actually out-performs Ludacris with flow and lyrics, which isn’t saying much. Some songs such as the Lil Kim & Lil Fate-assisted “Hey Ho” boasts good clap-and-stomp-inducing production and actually has a decent concept of addressing the gender double standard of sleeping around. Problem is both Lil Kim’s and Lil Fate’s flows and punchlines are boring and lackluster, and Ludacris dumbs down his verse in attempts to not outrank his features. Some collaborations worked like songs like the arrogant “I Do It All Night”, pairing Ludacris with Shawnna discussing who can give oral sex better, but unfortunately the song is laced on a generic sloth-like midi-keyboard beat, and coughs off a very basic repeating chorus consisting of, “I do it all night, I do it all night, I do it I do it do it do it all night”. Elsewhere are preverbal attempts at slow love-making tracks, such as the Ne-Yo -assisted, “Tell Me Your Secret” (which matches a played delivery & theme with sleep-inducing production, that even NeYo’s syrupy hook vocals can’t save), while “Sex Room” featuring Trey Songz (has the same repeating 3-piano keys all song long and packs enough unoriginal bedroom-clichés to come off more corny than sultry).
While still a very big Ludacris supporter, this was a VERY average album for me. The proposed comparison of men and women perspectives wasn’t focused on at all; nor was the women’s side of the argument really represented on a majority of the tracks. Even lyrically, which typically makes Luda interesting, it seemed half-hearted and lacked many of the quotable punchlines and humor that we’re used to from him. Again, I blame most of this on Luda being left with this album alone halfway through, when Shawnna switched labels – but it came off as a biased, rushed, one-sided discussion. Ultimately, Battles of the Sexes completely misses its advertised target and concept, and comes off simply as a quickly manufactured collection of club-ready songs. Infectious singles like “How Low” & “My Chick Bad” will probably be enough to rock airwaves during the first quarter of 2010, and garner Ludacris successful record sales…but I respectfully feel that this will rank among the least favorites in Ludacris’ discography. Ludacris is already promoting his 8th studio album, reportedly titled LUDAversial for a late 2010 release, so hopefully that will be his return to a more focused and lyrical album. |
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