Skillz is a name everyone knows but nobody knows. The reason you know him is because he’s dope! The reason you don’t know him is because he has never put out a good album. His last 3 albums have just been collections of his older songs, which has been disappointing. I understand that he has new distribution each time so he wants his songs to get out to everyone, but I KNOW he’s got some tracks stacked up, right? He couldn’t have sold ALL his rhymes to Puffy. So I was far from holding my breath as I went to listen to his new album, “Million Dollar Backpack.” I was, however, proven wrong in this case (first time ever). Also, my boy from Syracuse, Leonard Stevens (E Flat) got one of his beats on the album. E Flat’s song, “My Phone” is a story about how Skillz has many famous women in his cell phone. The beat is great, in the classic, kickback style of E Flat. Leonard plays steel lap guitar like no one I’ve ever seen or heard, and you can hear it shine on this song.
Lyrics - 4
Production – 4
Flow – 4.5
Albumness – 3.5
Overall - 4
-matty j
all of the ratings will be out of a 5 point system. obviously we won't be rating horrible albums, so all of the albums SHOULD be in the upper range, but who knows, one of us could be having a bad day when we do the review. BUT DON'T TAKE OUR WORD FOR IT!
flow - is how the emcees ride the beat and what their cadence is. this may also include evaluation on the emcees' voice and tone.
lyrical content - is what the rappers are ACTUALLY SAYING. we know that nobody listens to anything but the beat nowadays, but bear with us.
production - is the quality of the beats and other musical content on the album. thank god for 9th!
album-ness - how all the songs are cohesively arranged on the album and the overall feel of the album.
overall - self-explanatory.
