This verse should’ve never left the studio.
X’s overdubbed vocals and ad-libs sound more incoherent than menacing, stumbling through bars like a boxer on the ropes while Westside Gunn, Conway the Machine, and Benny the Butcher rap circles around him. Both verses are underwhelming and pale in comparison to their guests, but the “Hood Blues” verse is noticeably lackluster. Both “That’s My Dog,” a reunion track with fellow Yonkers rappers The Lox, and “Hood Blues,” the highly anticipated matchup with Buffalo trio Griselda, begin with their respective trio of guests before ending with an X verse as an attempt to build tension before the man of the hour bursts through the door. However, many of his verses across Exodus sound spent, his trademark bark hollowed out and strained. Swizz insists that the album was finished within X’s lifetime and that the only change made to the record was subbing out a previously used Pop Smoke verse for one by Memphis rapper Moneybagg Yo on the aptly titled “Money Money Money.” If this truly was X’s vision, his attempt to come back with a big bang with his partner-in-crime by his side, it sputters more often than it pops.Īt its best, X’s voice is magnetic, dragging everything in its orbit to the center like Scorpion from Mortal Kombat. On the contrary it was supposed to be a comeback album of sorts. In all fairness, Exodus wasn’t initially intended to be the swan song for DMX’s career. “We wanted to channel all those sides on this album.” It may have sounded like a fitting tribute on paper, but Exodus is largely sloppy and inconsequential, a sour note to bookend a storied legacy. “There are many different sides of X,” Swizz recently told Complex. According to longtime collaborator Swizz Beatz-who also executive produced the project-X wrestled with thoughts of retirement during the recording process, so they attempted to make Exodus as emotionally and musically varied as possible. DMX wasn’t the first rapper to turn their demons into jet fuel, but he lived to build an inspiring legacy that persisted even as his personal problems became public fodder for jokes and memes.Įxodus, his posthumous eighth studio album and first proper album since 2012’s Undisputed, was sparked by the overwhelming fan support shown during his Verzuz battle against Snoop Dogg in July 2020. 1 albums, several hit singles, and film roles. His constant struggles with drug addiction and mental health were a frequent topic in his music, coloring a tumultuous 30-year career that included five consecutive No. Since the early 1990s, X had funneled a life of unspeakable adversity into music as pious as it was grisly, a guttural voice confronting his own personal hell in order to see heaven. This makes it all the more special when a rapper does cross over into middle age, a privilege only some of the genre’s legends have been able to enjoy.ĭMX had just turned 50 before he passed away on April 9, 2021. Over the last three years, the rap community has lost a string of young talent to gun violence ( Pop Smoke), drug overdose ( Juice WRLD), and other unfortunate circumstances. Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G., two of the most important rappers of all time, were murdered in their mid-20s, barely six months apart.
Death often forces fans and critics to prematurely unpack a rapper’s legacy, whether they were cut down in their prime or before they began to truly blossom. Aging in hip-hop is still a fairly new phenomenon.
0 kommentar(er)
