Album is a 3/5, and I think I'm being a bit generous:
Here are my full impressions:
The beginning of the album is garbage besides the opener "Gangsta," and that doesn't even really wow me. The songs just sound forced, the 2 Chainz collab sounds a bit forced, and Los Awesome sounds like a Swizz track in the worst way possible. Right from the start the album's weaknesses become most apparent. The structure of the songs and the way they are composed just sound so artificial. The album is so formulaic, predictable, and seems to be yet another offender of unabashed pandering, but even the pandering is archaic.
The middle of the album gets a bit better, Hoover Street sounds like classic grimey Q, and even if it's a bit predictable, it's exactly what I wanted and expected to hear out of a Q's first major retail push. Studio is decent, but the hook already seems quite overbearing, and I can tell that this song will not age well at all.
Prescription/Oxymoron is probably the first genuinely great track on the album. and that's sad because we're already halfway through. It sounds so genuine, features a great beat switchup, and allows the listener the closest glimpse into who Q really is and what sets him apart from the other TDE rappers. It's one part confessional, one part swagged out grimey trap shit. Not many other people can make the transition sound so natural.
The Purge features a really weak beat, that outstays it's welcome well before its nearly five minute mark. It sounds like a Goblin b-side, Q's verse is nice, but man Tyler doesn't hold up his own at all, and those horns get kind of annoying. Just a really middling track.
Blind Threats is fantastic. Raekwon's verse is so classic Wu-Tang, and that beat features these fast, yet somewhat soft drums reminiscent of those found in Nas' Like a Man. Q has a great verse, doing his flawed remorseful gangsta rap thing. And the verse is littered with enough humor to not make it sound too one-dimensional. Q just sounds so aware of his immorality and mortality on this joint.
Hell of a Night sounds like a track the record executives force fed to Q.
The album ends well. Break Da Bank, and Man of the Year are strong tracks, especially the former, but you've already heard them so I won't waste time on them. I will just say I absolutely love the chorus and beat on Break Da Bank, he's doing this raspy singing thing that sounds like a grimier version of Ja Rule's junt, and man he's spitting with such an creative flow that fits the song perfectly.
