Grow'd up a screw-up
Jay-Z’s Black Album is oft-cited ‘roundabout these parts as a source of major workday inspiration. The hustle, the flow, the bounce, the method-all of the major factors that went into what we at the Resonator Mag office see as his greatest work since Reasonable Doubt (which R. Jamz will one day illustrate the brilliance of in elicit detail) are also what makes the record “The User’s Guide to Getting’ That Paper”.

That’s why it took a minute to wrap my noggin around last year’s Kingdom Come-it’s not that it’s boring, it’s just that Hov fell off the wagon and made an album about the joy of being “all growed up” (watch that-it’s the theme of 07). In the wake and stead of the tremendous Rap records that dropped last year (Pharrell, Nas, Jigga, etc), the music-consuming public forgot ‘bout Luda:



It’s a shame that even Spankrock, doing their Backyard Betty sweet talkin’, overshadowed Release Therapy, and it’s a shame that I never gave the album a proper listen until recently, though I’ve had it kicking around my car since it dropped and have loved every fierce minute of it. It’s the first time that, on an entire record, Ludacris strips away the tweak-job exterior that he’s been using since day 1, the same goofy methodology that’s kept anyone from ever really taking him seriously on his own stuff while gobbling up every guest-spot verse he’s spit think about it: everyone knows his lines from Missy Elliot’s “One Minute Man”-c’mon, say it with me: “Ludacris balance and rotate all tires”. Release Therapy replaces the prat-fall goof that Luda’s known for with his own Black Album, a hungry push to just rhyme, a ferocious desire to detail the ins-and-outs as he knows them and to elevate those around him. Granted, this is a story we’ve heard before-mo’ money, mo’ problems-, but Ludacris’ skill with a pen and a mic are undeniable, and if they weren’t he’d never have survived his Clown Prince of Rap days, nor would he be able to have made an album both as serious and as quality as this one.



Ludarcis: Grew Up A Screw Up

This is the second track on Release Therapy and yeah, Young Jeezy’s on this, and yes, the hook is built around a Biggie sample-both of those may be draws, but neither of those are the point. This is the song that constantly drew me back to the album, and the one that puts a fire in the gut-Ludacris’ moment of inspiration, or “moment of clarity”, and I’m thankful for it. Over that pounding B.I.G.-sampled chorus (“I grew up a fuckin’ screw up/Got into the game and fuckin’ blew up”), Ludacris takes his youth apart and puts it back together in a way that makes it plausible to go from the gutter to the stars without selling coke, which, in the RapScape of right now, is a revolutionary concept. His last lines always draw me back in:

Reach ya hand in the air, you can play wit tha stars
Ain’t the hand thatcha dealt but how ya playin your cards

I had Release Therapy in my car the other day, in dire and desperate need of the title’s promise, and, for the first time, I let the album play through. Scattered amongst Ludacris’ tales of coming up from nothing, delivered in his rapid-fire Burberry-laced throatpunch style, I found:

Ludacris ft. R Kelly: Woozy

The quirkiest slow-jam in recent memory-an ode to post-coital naptime. As Ludacris slows down and plays with his flow to match the mood of the song (one could label it his “nappy patter”), R-Kel sings about how, and this is a DIRECT quote, “I always wanted to go down on a girl that reminds me of me”. It’s not old-skool Ludacris, and feels a bit mis-sequenced on the album, but my god what a concept for a song. It makes me think of how utterly, compellingly and oddly sexy I always found Madonna’s Bjork-penned “Bedtime Story”, with its’ chorus of “let’s get unconscious, honey”-there’s something about the idea of mixing sex and sleep that’s undeniable.




Ludacris: Stand Up

Ok, look: I can’t post on Ludacris without this track, which has the single greatest Kanye-penned verse of all time:

”How you ain’t gon’ fuck, bitch
I’m me
I’m the got-damn reason you in V.I.P.”

Sheer and absolute genius when it comes to expressing the mindset of Thee Bling’d Out Star, and inspiration for, hopefully, thousands of Hip-Hoperas to come.

I’m finding Release Therapy worthy of a re-listen, especially now as the 07 dust just begins to be kicked up, while we wait to see what the year’s going to offer. It’s an introspective look at a powerful, major lyricist and cutting-edge artist who, uh, let’s face it-we didn’t really THINK had introspective qualities.




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