Heltah Skeltah’s third Album dropped on September 30. It’s been almost 10 years to the day since they released Magnum Force which I’ve had in my collection for almost as long.
It must be said that this third release must be long anticipated by fans and with Sean Price’s latest couple of releases in the past few years I was looking forward to this.
I must say that I hadn’t seen the cover but had I it may have let me know to expect a bit of a change and 10 years in the Rap game is a long time.
This album is chock full of some of the hottest names in production going around at the moment.
Such talent as Illmind, Marco Polo, Evidence, M-Phazes, Stu Bangaz and Khrysis lend their hands to the tracks and pretty much every joint has a different producer.
Lyrically it’s the same old Heltah Skeltah although it might be that my taste’s matured over the past decade but I found much of it quite boring and throwaway. There were a few funny lines such as Rock in the track Da Beginning of da End “That’s not a Gun this is a Gun I’m the Rockadile Dundee” and “That ain’t a Throwback your Jersey just old Black” from That’s Incredible.
For me the best tracks came in the middle of the album. The title track D.I.R.T. which stands for Da Incredible Rap Team a rather average description for a rather average realease. I also liked the following track So Damn Tuff ft. Rustee Jux which has the age old favourite sample “Why has it got to be So Damn Tuff” from Tuff Crew’s – My Part of Town. The other two standouts were Hellz Kitchen by Evidence & Insane produced by Marco Polo which is funny because I was watching Kimbo Slice get KO’d by Seth Petruzelli whilst listening to it and interestingly Kimbo himself gets a mention on Ape Food which features the Representativez.
Some good news I heard while researching this was on the Boot Camp Clik Myspace blog.
Buckshot has been released from Hospital and according to the Blog walked out doing the Macarena. Buckshot was severely dehydrated and suffered 9 seizures in less than a day he had been hospitalized the last 8 days and now plans to get back to work on a project with KRS One and another album with 9th Wonder.
The production helps D.I.R.T. from being a fairly mediocre album to one that’s at least worth a listen but I had hoped for a lot more lyrically and this is often let down by foolhardy banter. It’s alright but nothing too special.
Overall Grade:
B
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