Omar Credle takes four years to recover from the commercial and especially critical defeat of his previous album ("Bot Appetit") and returns to publish what is his fourth LP. Since his debut on the circuit, the young man has evolved, even calling on guests from beyond his apartment building on his second album, though keeping things strictly NYC.
This album is a sort of return to his roots for the former Diggin in the Crates Crew member, as he creates a project almost entirely without guests, the only one being Pharoahe Monch, the same rapper who guested on OC's first LP. For the first time, the rapper does not rely on the production of a member of the DITC in-house team and in particular he does without Buckwild, who had produced most of his records, 20 tracks out of 42, practically half, and whose name is still linked to the best musical moments of Credle's artistic career.
The emcee decides to draw a line between his name and the nineties and chooses to entrust his musical set to emerging beatmakers in order to search for a new original sound, giving space to Soul Supreme, the effort's main producer, Vanguard, and Floyd the Locsmif. Statik Selektah is credited to intro and outro, the scratches are provided by Statik himself, DJ Revolution and The Locsmif. The record is recorded in Boston and half the disk is mixed by the Wu-Tang engineer José "Choco" Reynoso at the Wu-Tang Studios, courtesy of The RZA.
The tape is introduced by scratches of Statik Selektah, then the only guest of whole CD is present in next track "Evaridae": Pharoahe Monch is confined to the chorus, alongside OC on an exquisite liquid jazz beat devised by The Locsmif. The same beatmakers creates the soundscape for "Who Run It?", good drum, honeyed piano keys, ill scratches by The Locsmif. Vanguard drops a lively boom bap in "The Professional" with cheerful trumpets, OC spits confident and hard. Soul Supreme realizes the funky beat for "1nce Again", boom bap with rough drum, fresh scratches by Statik Selektah, cheerful horns, OC is almost overwhelmed by the rhythm. Soul Supreme stays behind the keys for "Ya Don't Stop", soul production, imaginative boom bap, OC doesn't shine lyrically over a beat which is born a little crooked and that is ideal for the club. The choice to place two minutes of instrumental at the end is curious, the rhythm didn't really deserve them.
The choice number seven is "Story to Tell", where the Brooklyn emcee drop a street narration over a boom bap that has a skeletal drum and soul flavor. "What Am I Supposed To Do?" boasts one of the finest rhythms of the whole effort: Soul Supreme is credited at the production, hypnotizing samples, acoustic guitar, piano keys, OC goes regular. Now, in 2005 the disk was released with a press error on the CD and back-case in which the track 9 ("Getaway") and the track 10 ("Memory Lane") are inverted. Twenty years later, the error persists, for whatever reason, on whatever digital platform you're listening to this record, which is a problem.
Vanguard keeps his best soundscape for "Memory Lane", a musical gem: deep bass line, slow calm drum, acoustic guitar, sweet strings which give a tone of sweetness to the whole rhythm, light piano keys, wonderful sample from 21st Century's "Remember the Rain". Omar Credle goes with a silky style, even though the mix doesn't quite match his performance, making his voice sound "under" the beat. Luckily, it's an excellent production. Lyrically, the piece is a kind of sequel of "Born 2 Live", the author reflects on his childhood and his life.
Soul Supreme returns for "Getaway" that is, I don't really know. It sounds like someone stole a beat from Just Blaze for Jay-Z's "Blueprint" saying "it's too good and clean to pass off as an underground beat from some DITC rapper no one remembers; better to dirtier it up a bit and make it sound more like garbage." And the resulting sound is a bit like that. Omar Credle can't save this, but at this point if he couldn't do it, one of the most talented emcees to come out of New York in the mid-nineties, I don't think there is anyone who could have done it. It's almost the exact musical opposite of the previous track, which makes it even more shocking that the track names and placement are still wrong more than twenty years after the CD's physical release.
After writing this sentence, I listened to "Memory Lane" again, and it's truly absurd, as if someone had slept through both the mixing and the mastering. There doesn't seem to have been any supervision after the first mix. It's as if the guy saw that the check hadn't arrived yet because there was a problem with the bank in the Cayman Islands that caused a delay of a couple of weeks in payment, and when asked if he'd mixed this track, he replied "yes, yes, of course..." without even looking at the song or touching anything at all, and moved on to the next one. It's a shame, because with a little more attention to mixing, mastering, and post-production, this could easily have been OC's third-best album after his two great records from the '90s, which are still vying with the best hip-hop albums of the decade.
"Special" is similar to the rhythm of "Getaway", Soul Supreme again behind the keys, the production isn't good nor bad at all. Omar Credle spits slow, the beat obviously slows it down, the music is cumbersome, bogged down, it doesn't move forward, it goes into reverse, and his lyrics are weak. Locsmif remixes his cut "Who Run It?", there's nothing exceptional. Outro by Statik. The tape has three bonus tracks. A remix of Pete Rock for "1nce Again", it sounds bad. Count Bass D and Illmind remix the same song, "Story to Tell", without offering a real highlight for this CD, although Illmind was close, his production has something.
His fourth effort marks his return to form within the underground game: his lyrics level is good but repetitive (he's back), he delivers with a calm flow, and production's entrusted to capable beatmakers — Locsmif, Vanguard & Soul Supreme — which maintain a solid, relaxed, jazzy and soulful sound that doesn't wanna disappoint, however, it could be a little better. After the failed attempt of the commercial "Bon Appetit" which had cost him the loss of respect and credibility from the streets, he comes back with an honest LP, released by Grit Records only in Japan due to sampling problems. Statik's beats are the best here, what a shame they're in the intro and outro.
Highlights: "Evaridea", "Who Run It?", "1nce Again", "Memory Lane".
Rating: 7/10.
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