Daniel "Termanology" Carrillo arrives at the debut album on the heels of his "Hood Politics" mixtape series, of which he published five chapters (2003-07). He released a collaborative album in 2006, among many stands out "This is Hip Hop", piece that places him in the famous Unsigned Hype of "The Source" and is among the favorites of DJ Premier, with whom Termanology manages to get in touch.
Premier has produced for all the biggest hip-hop artists you can imagine: Rakim, O.C., King Lou, J. Mega and yes, even Guru. But in recent years he has stopped a bit and produced rare hits for underground artists such as Non Phixion ("Rock Stars"), Ras Kass ("Goldyn Chyld"), Royce da 5'9" ("Boom"; "Hip Hop"), Bumpy Knuckles ("Paine"), AZ ("The Come Up", "The Format") and Blaq Poet ("We Gonna Ill"), all classic records, without disdaining productions for pop stars such as Snoop Dogg, Black Eyed Peas and Christina Aguilera.
Preemo also produces Puerto Rican rapper Termanology's new single, "Watch How It Go Down," and puts the boy in a remix of Christina Aguilera's own hit that he produced, "Back in the Day". "Watch How It Go Down" puts the spotlight on Carrillo, on whose figure numerous expectations are starting to be generated. For Termanology's debut album the list of producers is made up of a list of names that is described as stellar, it's far-fetched for an underground artist: the aforementioned DJ Premier, Easy Mo Bee, Buckwild, Havoc, Hi-Tek, Large Professor, Nottz, Pete Rock and The Alchemist. There are so many masterpiece albums behind these names that it's hard to keep count. Guests are Prodigy of Mobb Deep, Bun B of UGK, Lil' Fame of MOP, Sheek Louch of The LOX and Freeway of State Property.
The opening song has a good beat that ends after just forty seconds and turns out to be the only one from Easy Mo Bee, who is therefore here only for the name, because the rapper doesn't use this rhythm to build a track. The album continues quite well with an easy winner. Termanology relies on the DJ Premier-produced single that he released two years earlier, "Watch How It Go Down", which thanks to Preemo's magic is still fresh: the beat is originally intended for Blaq Poet and also features a verse from The Alchemist, however, the producer born in Beverly Hills feels he didn't nail the beat and this remains unused by Premier until Statik Selektah listen to it and decides to buy it from Preem to pass it on to Termanology.
Lawrence's emcee struggles to break out of the shadowy mixtape circuit spitting out a single socio-conscious political verse for four minutes composed of some of his most inspired lyrics on a sensational production by Premier. "Respect My Walk" is one of the worst beats of the great career of one of the best producers in hip-hop like Buckwild. The rhythm is bad, the loop is bad, those strings are really annoying, this is clearly a discard by him, Term tries hard but can't save the track. "Hood Shit" is almost worse than the previous one from a musical point of view and the signature on the beat is by Alchemist. Another waste. Prodigy delivers with a mood that almost seems as if he's at first elated at rapping over an Alchemist beat, but then he was disappointed after hearing the production itself.
"Float" isn't the worst beat Nottz has come up with, but he's very far from the top. Nottz is also the only beatmaker to place two beats in a row on this record, also producing the following cut, "Please Don't Go": the track is nailed to the floor by a vocoder-sung hook in a commercial attempt realized by Termanology, totally useless and non-essential in the economy of the album. Bun B joins Term in "How We Rock", the second beat created by DJ Premier: the half of Gang Starr creates a mesmerizing beat, while the Lawrence rapper trades bars alongside half of UGK. Honest cut. Nottz surprisingly returns behind the keyboards for the third (and final) time on four tracks: it's strange to rely so much on the Norfolk producer when you have so many bigger heavyweights at the boards.
For "Drugs, Crime & Gorillaz" Nottz's rhythm is still not good, but Termanology decides to steal the flow clearly from Eminem, while delivering bars alongside Sheek Louch and Freeway, who deliver with more energy than the lead rapper. Hi-Tek signs the beat of "In the Streets": the production tries to be triumphant without success, ending up disappointing, here too the guest Lil Fame surpasses the host Term. DJ Premier produces his third song in "So Amazing", which maintains the same formula as his recent hits such as those for AZ's singles ("The Come Up", "The Format") and was born as a fresh natural banger, however, Termanology manages to turn it into a generic track on his album in which he pays homage to the greats.
A fluid production from Large Professor follows for track number eleven, in which Term delivers slower on an electric piano that adds nothing to the record. "We Killin' Ourselves" boasts Pete Rock behind the keyboards: the drum doesn't live up to that name either and the loop is unmemorable, while the rapper spits socio-conscious lines with a soporific style over a beat that sounds like one of Pete Rock's outtakes. The album is closed by a production managed by Havoc and is a negligible beat, unfortunately.
Termanology's solo debut studio album. The guy's talented, he's got a decent flow, he has honest technique, good wordplay, his lyrics are ok and he's supported by excellent rappers on the mic and by some of the best producers of the period. All the ingredients are there to have a classic album, one of the best records of the 2000s. It's just like a cake but, (un)predictably, something goes wrong.
The rapper doesn't know which direction to take, whether to make another mixtape for an underground audience or aim for the mainstream with a commercial album: a bland, dull and inoffensive record comes out, where the emcee shows little of his talent, he shows he doesn't have the skills and the personality to carry an album alone for three quarters of an hour and to stand out from the competition, being knocked down by his own average lyrics that deal with generic backpack rapper themes (weed, women, street, bravado, socio-conscious excerpts, battle rap) which he delivers effortlessly using a generic, weak and lackluster rapping style most of the time, when he isn't copying one of the greats he says he takes inspiration from (all the Brooklyn rappers you know, half the ones from Queens, and not least Eminem, of course), believing himself to be the heir to almost all those artists of the nineties and the savior of the rap game in 2008.
Prodigy, Bun B, Freeway, Sheek Louch and Lil' Fame don't disappoint, although none of their appearances stick in the memory or rank among the best in their catalogues. The producers involved in this effort offer the author a set of beats that, rather than being in the B series, are in the C series relegation zone, playing a crucial part in the failure of the project.
Released by Nature Sounds and his own ST Records, this should be the album that launches him into the mainstream as one of the best rappers on the East Coast, and instead it becomes a double-edged sword, hiding him away indefinitely in the underground circuit and in that of the mixtapes from which he had struggled to get out after years. The album gets critical approval and is pushed by local newspapers ("The Phoenix" from Boston gives the album a perfect score), remaining far from the charts. Overall, it's a disappointing album from your generic (battle) rapper, soon forgotten by fans and labeled as a "Illmatic formula that didn't work" album.
Rating: 5/10.
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