In the late nineties, Philadelphia's underground hardcore scene was exploding and Jay-Z, on his way to retirement, goes there to find the new rap talent who can breathe new life into the tired soul of New Jack City, cement the Roc-A-Fella legacy and keep the label at the top of the game for years to come even after Carter exits the hip-hop scene. Among the many talents present in the city of Philadelphia, Jay-Z chooses to bet on an inexperienced wild horse, without a demo tape, without a label, an unnamed stranger coming straight up the street, Dwight Grant: he performs under the pseudonym Beanie Siegel, later corrected to the definitive Beanie Sigel, combination of his grandmother's nickname ("Beanie") and the street where he grew up (Sigel Street), bearing the reference to 1930s gangster Bugsy Siegel.
After the boy impresses Shawn Carter in the recording studio during the sessions for "Vol. 2" (1998), Hova immediately brings him to his new album in the posse track "Reservoir Dogs" featuring The LOX and Sauce Money. Overnight, Grant's life changes and Jay-Z decides that this noname will be a rapper and sit on his throne in a few years. Philadelphia's up-and-coming emcee is a guest on fellow Roots' masterpiece album "Things Fall Apart" on the track "Adrenaline": Beanie Sigel and Roots rapper Black Thought had been in the same rap group at school, with which they had won a contest.
In 1999, Sigel made high-profile appearances on records by Foxy Brown, Blackstreet, Ruff Ryders, Memphis Bleek, Puff Daddy, Eve and Biggie Smalls, also starting to record material for his debut solo album. At the end of the year, he was credited twice as a guest on Jay-Z's "Vol. 3", "Do It Again (Put Ya Hands Up)" with Amil, and the "Pop 4 Roc" posse, with Amil and Memphis Bleek. Sigel, Bleek and Amil (Freeway is an unofficial member) make up a group known as "The Dynasty", also promoted through an album of the same name, but which never manages to take off definitively. It's one of Jay-Z's last group attempts, after trying early on with mentor Jaz-O and other guys in the mid-80s with High Potent, after having been part of The Commission created by The Notorious BIG for a short time together with Charli Baltimore, Puff Daddy and Lil Cease, and after trying to create the triple threat Murder Inc. together with DMX and Ja Rule, which was short-lived.
Beanie Sigel is called to the litmus test in order to take up Jay-Z's legacy after protégé Memphis Bleek was no match for him, and in early 2000, the emerging Philadelphia emcee released his first album. Production features Kanye West, Just Blaze, Bink, Rockwilder, Buckwild, Daven "Prestige" Vanderpool, P. Skam, Sam Sneed, Robert "Shim" Kirkland, T-Mix, Bernard "Big Demi" Parker, Lofey and J-5. Guests are Jay-Z, Amil, Eve, Scarface and Memphis Bleek.
The album is opened by the title track, enveloping production by Kanye West, fresh, haunting, dark rhythm, careful and punctual rapping by Beanie Sigel, which sums up the concept of the entire album. Just Blaze credited for "Who Want What", lively, melodic, dusty rhythm, hardcore delivery by Sigel joined by one of the members of Dynasty, Jay-Z friend Memphis Bleek. Shawn Carter himself guests on the third track, "Raw & Uncut," over a bouncy, upbeat beat by Bink, good rapping by both. The first half of the record is solid and fun. In the fourth choice, Robert "Shim" Kirkland decides that Pac Man can become a beat for a hip-hop song, it's a really good idea, according to him: unfortunately, the final result proves this interesting experimentation by Kirkland wrong. Sigel puts down a curious and inventive concept, nevertheless, here he's useless for four minutes and an album potentially among the best of the season, released by one of the hottest names of the moment, it's ruined.
"Playa" has several problems. The hook is tired and questionable. The production is terrible and unbearable, T-Mix creates a beat that is impossible to keep going. Beans and Jay aren't bad, but what is Amil up to? It's hard to understand what she's saying because the beat is louder than her voice. Bernard "Big Demi" Parker provides the beat of "Everybody Wanna Be a Star", the music is accessible and melodic, the hook sung by the girl and revised by Sigel works, the rapping is good, I have nothing to say. It's curious that a couple of producers here, Kirkland and Parker, have chosen monikers similar to those used by the internal producers of Puff Daddy's Hitmen team even though they are not part of it.
Eve, a fellow citizen of Sigel, is a guest on "Remember Them Days", performing the hook on a dry, sunny morning production from Lofey, good rapping from Beanie in a rare mainstream track mandated by major label and intended for the club. Rockwilder tries cinematic beat for "Stop, Chill," with mixed results: the rhythm is bad, the drum is too loud, the sample is stretched, little seems to work in this mess, maybe just those sick and murderous violins in the background, but they're too far away to hurt, they're harmless. Poor and directionless track. Scarface kills his cut by playing back and forth with Sigel on a bouncy, sparse production made by J-5 that they could go on and on about. "What a Thug About" meets Buckwild's bouncy, simplistic production, bad beat that devalues the performance of the emcee.
The eleventh pick is the record's highlight and one of the strongest tracks of Beanie Sigel's career, "What Ya Life Like": over a bleak, minimal and frightening soundscape, created by Robert "Shim" Kirkland, Sigel at his best delivers one of the most terribly serious and dramatic prison songs ever made. The next piece has accessible and triumphant production invented by Bink, good rapping, unfortunately nothing memorable comes out. Daven "Prestige" Vanderpool is the only beatmaker to actually arrive from the Puff Daddy's The Hitmen production team, and invents the musical background for "Die", last real song on the album where Sigel sounds inspired in a dark track about death with a light, beautiful and haunting production.
Beans' debut concludes with a bonus track performed exclusively by Jay-Z, "Anything", a scrap track from the album "Vol. 3". Something similar also happens in the album of the previous designated heir Memphis Bleek in his latest album "534" (2005), when Jay-Z inserts his song "Dear Summer" at the beginning, which unlike this one, is considered to be a gem. P. Skam and Sam Sneed are the authors of a glossy, mainstream, slow and accessible production: the track is practically twin of "Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)" from "Vol. 2", and is notable as one of the best productions to happen to Hova in the late nineties, despite an almost unlistenable shrill hook sung by a child — which comes from "I'd Do Anything", a song from a 1968 film remake of the musical "Oliver!" (1960), based on the novel "Oliver Twist" by Dickens — and his obvious commercial attempt. Jay-Z expects the song to be a big hit just like the relative "Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)" and that it helps propel sales of his new protégé Beanie Sigel's debut, however, the record rebounded off the charts, not progressing on the Hot 100 and stopping early on the other charts as well, climbing positions only in the UK, where it's second among hip-hop singles.
The album is released by Roc-A-Fella and Def Jam, fifth on the Billboard 200, second among rap records, Sigel's only project certified gold by the RIAA, is one of the best sellers of the season and could do even better, because Def Jam doesn't commit to promoting the project. Two singles are extracted, the title track and "Remember Them Days", both hit the charts without reaching the top 20 among hip-hop singles. The disc boasts thirteen songs, plus the additional bonus of Jay-Z, without skits or interludes, and with minimal commercial concessions such as a few club tracks and no love songs, a rare occurrence for a mainstream hip-hop album. Label execs aren't happy with Beanie Sigel's direction, but the artist proves to be inflexible in creating commercial songs attractive for the radio, he shows that he doesn't want to bend to the will of the label, and at one point he waves a gun in the face of a Def Jam executive in a meeting. The Philadelphia rapper, who was still on the street a few years earlier, manages to create the album he wants and the critical response proves him right, the effort is received positively, the magazine "The Source" exaggerates and assigns it 4.5 mics out of 5, a rating equal to that of some records considered classics in hip-hop.
The musical set is as hard and raw as the performer's rap, the production has a cohesive sound that is similar to that of the earlier "Vol. 3" (1999) and the follow-up "Dynasty" (2000), both by Jay-Z, and inaugurates the presence of Just Blaze and Kanye West on a Roc-A-Fella album, for both this is the first. Beanie Sigel delivers bars with a determined, confident and energetic style, a solid, smooth and rough flow, which almost never changes and becomes monotonous as the minutes go by, also due to elementary metric patterns. The guy details his arguments well, which revolve around the dictates of gangsta rap and consist of street themes, thuggin, prison, violence, hustling and some conscious moments, all with a veil of melancholy and darkness. In summary it's a good street album with few flaws from a street rapper who proves to be the best of the Roc-A-Fella elect.
Rating: 7/10.
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