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E-40 Album Review: MY GHETTO REPORT CARD

“I don’t sound like none of y’all, you getting independent [money]?, just remember the n$$$az that taught you that… Bay Area!!!...Tell the people that E-40 is back“ – E-40, “Yay Area”.

510!!!...415!!!!...707!!!...916!!!....BAY AREA!!!!...YAY AREA!!!!.....Don’t sleep on the Bay Area!!! That NorthWest (San Francisco/Oakland to Seattle) region has been representing hiphop since the Sir Mix-A-Lot days. And E-40 picked up where Sir Mix-A-Lot left off joining Too Short as the main Northwest playaz in the game. But ever since Too Short moved to Atlanta it seems the Bay Area lost most of its steam.

Fear not. E-40 has hooked up with a new click of young hyphyed out n$$$az and released his TWELTH ALBUM entitled MY GHETTO REPORT CARD. With this album he plans on infecting the world with the newest hiphop sickness called H-Y-P-H-Y. My first love is hiphop and the main reason why is the creativeness of my culture when it comes to musical art forms. My Black American forefathers created Blues, Rock & Roll, and Soul/R&B but my generation created hiphop. Hiphop is the most diverse genre of music to ever come to Planet Earth and the subcultures formed from this Black American genre puts all other cultures to shame. Just stroll through Black America and you can feel what I’m saying. Let’s start in hiphop’s birthplace and you’ll hear the crisp percussion and battle-ridden lyrics of NY.

Travel through Baltimore and you’ll hear their own version of hyper-house music that has a unique style of dance to go with it …Hit D.C. and the youth still bang to go-go music with it’s foundations in live music…..On down to Atlanta where CRUNK music rules all….Stroll on down to Florida and you can dust off your Two Live Crew and Magic Mike cassettes and ponder on the great energy of BASS music which started out with slow to mid-tempo beats until Miami sped it up…Take a quick flight to London, England and get introduced to the movement American hiphop built called GRIME rap where the youngins rhyme at supersonic speed to hyper Bass beats; but of course they are all sons of groups like Bone Thugs & Harmony, Twista and Freestyle Fellowship.

Sorry London but America did that style almost 20 years ago to perfection with better beats…Hop back on the plane and head to Texas and there you have the home of SCREW music….Can’t forget the Memphis area with their special brand of hypnotic TRANCE music perfected by 3-6 Mafia and crew….Keep heading north and Chicago still bangs out that old school original house music while the younger cats came up on GHETTO HOUSE….Head to LA and you got the smoothed out FUNK grooves of the West Coast that Dr. Dre took to new heights..And now you can head straight Northwest to the Bay Area and witness the world’s newest hiphop craze, H-Y-P-H-Y. I swear I love to death the creativity of my culture. I’m hiphop till the day I die!! I wouldn’t wish to be anything else but a Black American (No offense to any other culture/race).

But what is Hyphy you say? Well no one can sum it up better than the folks on E-40’s website – “The energy of the youth created a power so strong that the music coming out of the bay was forced to follow suit, giving the streets a soundtrack to the movement [CALLED HYPHY]. Hyphy has a dance component….This ultra-intense form of freestyle dancing is called going dumb. The customary fashion for Hyphy is jeans, white tees, dreads and big sunglasses called “stunna shades.” . Well said. So it is with great pleasure that I report on how a hiphop veteran like E-40 is using his legendary unique voice and slang to bring the Northwest back into the lime-light…

Those who witnessed the incredible video of E-40’s first single off the album called “Tell me When to Go” witnessed the powerful energetic beats and dances that defines Hyphy and also witnessed the fellaz “ghost ride the whip” where the driver hangs out the door of his “scraper” while simultaneously driving his car so that the novice observer swears that the car is driving itself! That song and video is the perfect embodiment of Hyphy and it’s no surprise that Lil Jon (the creator of the Crunk genre) produced this song - Not sure if people realize the greatness of Lil Jon’s production ability as he can produce a Hyphy beat with ease while also producing some of the biggest selling Reggaeton hits out. When you get the CD you’ll see there are plenty more songs with the same flavor and energy that are the embodiment of hyphy. Right at the start of the album a classic Digable Planets line is repeated incessantly (“We be to rap what key be to lock”) as the track heats up and E-40 reminds us why he is still one of the most talented rappers to ever pick up a mic. One of my favorite lines on the album comes from this song in which E tells us fellaz some great advice “Never tell a b$$$$ what your up to [Why?!] cause one day she might tell on you…Now you sitting up in the can, while she f$$$$$$ all your friends…riding around in your scraper [car]....Giving brains..…all the hood homies running trains..”. Then the “Ambassador of the Bay Area” blesses us with more straight hyphy in the form of “Muscle Cars”, “Go Hard or Go Home”, and “Gouda” (money).

But once your bones start getting too wore down from all the dancing from the first few tracks E-40 shows his versatility and slows things down to a more normal pace with a slew of songs so solid that it’s mind boggling. Basically from Track 6-15 E-40 hits us with nothing but quality hit after hit….Track after track. Tracks 7 and 12 are skits but you still got 8 tracks on this middle portion of the album that are ALL beyond solid. I was so impressed that I scrapped the plans I had to do an Outkast review and chose to showcase E-40 instead. Out of this selection of songs “White Gurl” stands out the most to me because not only do they mimic the raw old school beat of “Fly Girl” (One of my favorite old school songs of all time!!) but they also imitate the chorus but add that modern street twist to it and replace “fly girl” with “white gurl”. Now hold up sistas. Before you start getting all offended “white gurl” is referring to drugs and not an actual “White girl”. Though Bun B comes through and blesses the track by cleverly using “white girl” to refer to a person AND a narcotic. Man this song is a classic street song! Juelz Santana even comes through with a verse that’s actually pretty clever and Pimp C puts his spin on the track too. Needless to say E-40 rips it as usual when he spits “A-K will light up your chest like E.T!!”. Classic.

Now I haven’t even gotten to the song that will probably push his album to platinum status. That song is the commercial “U and Dat” featuring T-Pain that actually I have come to find very tolerable. You know Benz0 pretty much hates 99% of radio friendly commercial songs but this one is OK because the theme of the song is still about getting into a lady’s panties (my favorite hobby). But the name T-Pain makes me vomit almost every time after being forced to watch his “I’m Sprung” video fifty billion times due to it’s popularity on every video show. R&B thug I am not. But you gotta love E-40 cause he shows them dumb rappers how to walk the fine line between talking about girls they like while also keeping it hardcore. Check tracks 17-19 - “Just F$$$$$$”, “She Say“, and “Gimme Head” as exhibits A, B, and C your honor. “Gimme Head” features probably the sickest beat on the entire CD and sports a chorus that ALL true playaz can relate to. Listen to the chorus and you’ll see what I’m saying. Heck half of the girls I date these days make that chorus come true every weekend!...(Benz0 calm down!!)…..

If you’ve been reading this article it goes without saying that this album is BEYOND solid and is a MUST HAVE. No way you can try and download 3 to 6 songs and think you have all the songs you need. I would say EVERY track except the skits and the more mellow track 17 are MUST haves. The only album I can say is this solid in 2006 is J.R. Writer’s album. And to clue you in on what I mean. I mean the only other album in which pretty much EVERY song on the album is either solid or Outstanding. This album is one of those and needs to be picked up by every hiphop fan alive. Seriously. This album blew me away. Never figured an artist 15 years in the game could provide such innovative flavor…But then again we’re talking about E-40. The inventor of the most slang in hiphop history. He’s risen from the ashes to funk up the masses. PICK THIS F$$$$$$ ALBUM UP!!!

Benz0
Contact Benz0: BenzWritings@Hotmail.com