After a summer of highly anticipated and hyped releases, and after a summer of debated and disappointing releases. From the West Coast steps Game to deliver his much hyped and anticipated album in an attempt to raise the bar on the average of this summers releases.
In a reunion we been waiting for we finally here the good doctors voice on an album with Game again, this reunion has been every bit as anticipated as when Dr. Dre and Snoop first reunited, Dre teases listeners by beginning with the album intro which is a narration of the album.
The album then gets right to work, with a very good intro track, “The city” has a very cinematic sounding beat and game comes out with aggressive verses and flows, but its Kendrick Lemar that steals the scene by going hard on both the hook and his verse, way harder than whats expected for an intro track.
The next track we get what we’ve been waiting and anticipating in more ways than one, Dr. dre and Game reunite on a track and Dre raps. “ Drug Test” f/ Dre, Snoop,and Sly is good crew track thats an automatic headbanger guaranteed to make your neck bob. No complaints on the track, as DJ Khalil puts it down on the track and each of the artist deliver on it. But it does make you wonder how much harder the song may have been if Dr. Dre did the beat and if Nate Dogg was alive( RIP) how he could have attacked the track, no disrespect but it does make you wonder.
From that moment on Game goes on to teach a lesson in versatility and the art of the collaboration. RED Album is full of collaboration, but they each work, none of the collabos are forced sounding. Game jumps on a track with people from all walks and at all stages in their career, from all around the country, old new, hot, established , up and coming etc, etc.
“Martians vs Goblin” featuring Lil Wayne and Tyler the Creator is a good example of both versatility and chemistry on collabo, the song has a very weird sounding horror / video game ,sounding beat but Game and Tyler deliver with funny punchlines and Wayne delivers the hook with his voices to make an entertaining cut.
On “Ricky” and “The Good, The Bad, The Ugly” Game teaches how to story tell. He uses sound effects and samples to create the scene like a B.I.G track but uses the art of showing not telling in his lyrics like Slick Rick to bring the concepts of the records together and deliver to highly creative tracks. With “The Good, The Bad, The Ugly” being in my opinion the one of the best tracks on the album.
Game then gets Socially conscious on the track with Drake called Good Girl Go Bad, in the most gangster way possible and respectful way possible, they tackle a tough issue and talk about the need to respect women and appreciate them. Its done in a gangster way, creatively and not a popish R&B candy way, Big Respect for making the statement, showing growth and taking the risk, and pulling it off.
The album looses steam for minute with a three song set of R&B style tracks and collabos, with Chris Brown, Mario, and LLoyd respectively. None of the songs are not album quality song , its the placement of them, they slow the album down rather continue to build and take the album in an entirely different direction that it never quite recovers from, it would be hard to figure out which if any to take off and it would take away from the versatility displayed if the were not on the album at all, so you take the good with the bad, a catch 22 because game delivers, shows and proves on each.
At the albums end Game continues to show versatility, Jumping on a DJ Premier beat and straight murdering it delivering the albums best cut in my opinion, a Jazzy style beat reminiscent of a Tribe Called Quest beats, with an awkward collabo with Nelly Furtado that he still delivers on and a concept song California Dream allah B.I.G. , to close out.
In total the RED Album is a solid listen from beginning to end, with some replay and rewind ability. Lyrically its good , Sonically above average as Game shows that he be musical also, the production is good , the song making ability gets high notes and is the strongest quality, its entertaining, has originality, loads of versatility, it shows range speaking on different subjects, and has petty decent replay value. You’ll be able to listen to the whole album again, and certain songs are definite and others will grow on you. I’d give it 4 out of 6 stars.
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