Brooklyn Native J Jackson has been laying low for almost 3 years now since his last album Real Talk.
I have been waiting for this day to come for a long time now, and after the promising Advance dropped two weeks ago I couldn’t wait to hear what Fa-bo-lo-us had to say.
Tracklist:
- From Nothin’ To Somethin’ Intro
- Yep, I’m Back
- Change Up ft. Akon
- Make Me better ft. Ne-Yo
- Baby Don’t Go ft. T-Pain
- Return Of The Hustle ft. Swizz Beatz
- Gangsta Don’t Play ft. Junior Reid
- Real Playa Like ft. Lloyd
- First Time ft. Rihanna
- Diamonds ft. Young Jeezy
- Brooklyn ft. Jay-Z & Uncle Murda
- I’m The Man ft. Red Cafe
- Jokes On You ft. Pusha T
- What Should I Do ft. Lil’ Mo
- Bonus: This Is Family ft. Ransom, Freck Billionaire, Red Cafe, Joe Budden & Paul Cain
I don’t have time to really dig deep into this album tonight, but heres a little something.
First Take:
WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?
If I could ask Fabolous any one thing it would be “Why do you have featured guests on 13/15 tracks?”
The album opens up strong with track #2, “Yep, I’m back,” the ONLY solo track on the album ignoring the intro. The rhymes hit hard and the beat is kicking. This track is everything that I expected from Loso’s 4th LP. He’ll tell you about his Maybach 62’s back-to-back, and how he is still Frontin’ and Stuntin’.
I liked this:
“When it come to makin O’s, we like dunkin with ‘em,
nah, I ain’t talkin Donuts, I’m talkin whites ones like the Nike low-cuts”
I didn’t think that Fabolous watched Seinfield… I guess I was wrong
“Still let it slide through the door like Kramer”
After track #4 (maybe during it?) the entire album falls off. Take a look at the tracklist if you don’t have the CD yet. It goes from Akon into Ne-Yo into T-Pain. Is getting airplay on 106.1 BLI the cool new thing in Brooklyn? I can’t hate on Fab for trying to make money, sell a million copies, but this is out of control. One of these guys (Akon preferably, who by the way is the new Nate Dogg) would have been great on the album, but this Z-100 lineup is too whack for me to say that it is good, no matter how hot the Fabolous verses may be.
Oh yea, I forgot to tell you about how Lloyd busted all over track #8. Sick.
Return of the Hustle ft. Swizz Beatz – Um…. Fab… Didn’t this track drop in like February? Get outta here with this old shit… If this made the cut, then why couldn’t I get “Really Wanna Know ft. Jagged Edge?”
Brooklyn ft. Jigga & Uncle Murda - Awesome that Jay is on the CD… but couldn’t we have heard him without the annoying sample of Frank White? Hasn’t the Rap world raped his voice enough? Other than that – Hot. To be honest I didn’t want this to be on the CD when I heard the advance. I was looking for Big Things Poppin’ ft. Swizz Beatz & Cassidy (check it out if you can) to make the cut instead.
That’s all I can do right now… I’ll write up the rest of the album tomorrow
Peace out
Vercetti
