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Lil Kim Album Review: THE NAKED TRUTH

“No more Ms Nice Bi**h, ni**az done flipped the script and got on some shiest s**t, selling their souls when love is priceless, they kicked me when I was down and stuck in a crisis, I kept it all in and now I’m about to erupt..” - Lil Kim, “Slippin”.

“I’m going to jail for a year. Does that make sense?” Lil Kim asks. “You’ve got people convicted for gun charges that don’t do a day..”. Obviously frustrated on her situation, Lil Kim blasts the justice system. A system she swears is out to lock up as many hiphop stars as possible. It all started back one evening in 2001 (Ironically the year she won a Grammy) in front of the infamous WQHT aka Hot 97 radio station - Yes the same radio station where earlier this year 50 Cent’s click had a shootout with The Game’s click. That fateful night in front of Hot 97, Capone-N-Noreaga’s crew runs into Lil Kim’s crew and shots are fired by Lil Kim’s manager, Damon Butler, and another friend named Stu Jackson. See the background of the situation is that Noreaga’s

crew supports Foxy Brown (a rival female rapper). So on their 2nd album they let Foxy blast Lil Kim on a song called “Bang, Bang”. Well this is modern hiphop where words can get you killed so Capone and Co. get confronted about the song and the rest of the unfortunate events that followed are now a part of the ugly history that got Lil Kim jailed. Lil Kim would proceed to lie to the grand jury and swear that she didn’t see her 2 buddies firing shots or even see them at the scene. Obviously she failed to notice the Hot 97 cameras filming the whole brawl which also caught Lil Kim ON TAPE getting into a vehicle as her two aforementioned buddies opened the door for her in front of the station. To make matters worse 2 members of her original rap crew Junior Mafia - James ‘Lil Cease” Lloyd and Antoine “Banger” Spain - testified against her and told the judge Lil Kim and her buddies were all at the scene. Her penalty for lying? 366 days in jail and a $50,000 fine with probably 3 months chopped off her sentence if she’s on good behavior. Most people would have been devastated by this ugly turn of events but not Lil Kim. True to her hardcore rap persona she took the conviction stone faced in

March 2005 and immediately went to the studio to work on her 4th album THE NAKED TRUTH as the judge gave her 4 months grace time before she had to report to federal prison in Philadelphia. With so many life-altering events surrounding her Lil Kim has somehow managed to take all the negative energy and positively focus it into this latest album which is hands down THE BEST ALBUM SHE HAS EVER MADE. Don’t believe me? Well THE SOURCE gave it 5 mics making her the only female to ever receive such an honor. High praise but is this album really worth FIVE out of FIVE mics?

If you figured Lil Kim’s 4th album was probably going to be an average one due to her first single “Lighters Up” - which is exceptional lyrically but average musically - then you would have judged a book by its cover. First off anyone paying attention to the lyrics of “Lighters Up” can see that Kim absolutely rips it by breaking down everything that occurs in the Brooklyn projects from 12 year old prostitution to how “dice games kill more blacks than cancer”. Secondly, one peek inside this album and you start to realize Lil Kim has taken her game to a higher level. Right off the bat on “Spell Check” (which is sort of a remake of K-Solo’s classic “Spellbound”), Lil Kim aka Kimberly Jones starts releasing some of that pent up rage she held back during her trial. Peep her attack on them snitches Junior Mafia - “The [Mafia] is P-*-*-*-Y, I’m more ni$$a than them bi**h a$$ guys cause they took the stand on the DA’s side..”. It’s this energy and rage that takes this album to another level. Check her defiant attitude on the song “All Good” - “Now the DA wanna give me time in the fed, I’m from BROOKLYN, I can do the time on my head..”. But it’s on “Slippin” where the culmination of her frustration and rage on the whole ordeal is deftly channeled and bottled up musically. You really feel her as she spits “It’s a foul game, no such thing as fair play, and real ni**as get railroaded every day, Words misconstrued and used against you, then you get screwed when it’s time to sentence you…A year and a day and three year’s probation, public humiliation, poor representation, guilty by association”. Rounding out her anger is the song “Quiet” featuring The Game doing the chorus as she lets the studio gangsters have it and also serves as a defiant statement against 50 Cent who she has beef with now as well.

But while Kim releases her frustration on several songs she also shows she still is gonna be Lil Kim and let her sensual and party side shine through as well. “Gimme That” is beyond raunchy and borderline juvenile but she hits the jackpot on the erotic “Kitty Box” which is on par to her previous hit “How Many Licks”. If she releases this next this should put her album at platinum status like her previous La Bella Mafia album. She then teams up with Snoop on “Kronik” in which Lil Kim herself represents that “chronic” that every ni**a wants. We also see she still hasn’t lost confidence either as she totally stunts and flosses on “I Know You See Me”. She then finds time to hit us off with an incredible Down South type banger called “We Don’t Give A F**K” featuring Bun B and Twista that really gets the blood flowing. Capping off the feel good songs is the inspiring “Whoa” which is musically disguised as a club song but in actuality has more lyrics attacking Junior Mafia and more defiant lyrics against her haters.

Amazingly Lil Kim actually tries to make EVERY song great on this album. I mean what a novel concept right? I think she fails on “Gimme That” but other than that I cannot name one other flaw on the album. Even the 2nd worst song on the album called “Get Yours” is far from wack and features the sneaky skills of T.I. If I wanted to I could nit pick and point out how Lil Kim’s brief attempt at singing on one part of the song “Dirty” was just simply atrocious but she beats me to it by telling us as she’s singing that she can’t really sing. This album is DEFINITELY A MUST HAVE for all. It’s Lil Kim at her best as this album will most likely tip the scales in her favor when considering the question of who is the greatest modern female MC of our time. Mc Lyte of course was the rawest female ever but she represents the old school. Lil Kim is the here and now and has been hot for TEN years straight. No other female MC out can really approach her combination of skill, appeal, longevity and

stardom. Truly, I can’t believe Kimberly has come out with her best album yet on her 4th album. That’s unheard of for a veteran artist to get better as their career grows older. Now I wouldn’t give this album five out of five mics because I think to get that your album has to change the game or produce a whole different genre, but I’d give this album 4 and a half mics mainly due to 14 out of 15 full length tracks being above average either lyrically or musically and also for the way she is able to channel musically everything that happened to her during her trial that led to her current incarceration that officially started Sep. 19th, 2005. Pick this album up! It’s a great album.

Benz0
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