Crooked borrows some of the better-known beats to rap over on this project. Menace II Sobriety Fkfame - Luniz - I Got Five on It Life of a Bandana - Nas - I Gave You Power Flowers - Coolio - Gangster's Paradise Best Tracks: Life of a Bandana.

Most of the production on this album is great. The beats are intertwined in funk basslines and many fantastic samples. While Cube came a bit harder, some of it feels a bit like his earlier albums. The rappers don't grab me like the aforementioned artist, or like the best of them though. Their vocal presence leaves something to be desired in my opinion. They don't have an X factor. Best Tracks: Dig It!, I Ain't the Nigga, Funk, Pam's Song, Fo da Money

Some of these tracks sound almost like a mash-up, not your traditional Coolio production by any means. Not all good tracks but I like the best songs enough to give this a decent rating. Best Tracks: Change vs. Ennio Morricone, I Will, Cruis Off, She Loves Me

Like with many conceptual albums I've listened to, I don't completely think the story the artist is trying to tell works as well as they'd hope. However, Brotha Lynch has said in an interview that it should make more sense and come together over the next two albums which will finish the trilogy. Anyway, track for track this is a fairly solid horrorcore album. There is nothing too weak, some nice tracks that are mentioned below and overall while the beats do feel a bit too alike they are fairly bangin'. Like I said, not really feeling the story makes the skits feel pointless, but I guess in this digital age it's not that big a deal. As with most horrocore, the lyrics can become a lil' repetitive which bring the album down a tad for me, however, there are enough tracks I enjoy enough to give this a reasonable rating. Worth checking out even if you may need to hit the skip button a few times. Best Tracks: Colostomy Bag, Murder Over Hard, I Tried to Commit Suicide, Meat, I Plotted (My Next Murder)

With all the big name artists that release records it's generally someone you've never heard of that you enjoy more, and this is an example of that. I find this album to be a hour of consistency, which probably as another review mentions contains some of the best stuff towards its conclusion. There are some interesting and original tracks where Blacastan talks about life from the point of view of a dice in 'The Dice Life', and the life of a cassette tape in 'The Life of a Tape' which lyrically is something fairly different and similar to what Nas did with 'I Gave You Power' on It Was Written where he spoke about life from the point of view of a gun. Tracks such as 'Best That I Can' and 'How Can You Be So Sure' are among the best and feature a nice contrast between the hard beats and lyrics compared to the emotionally sung hooks. The only real negative for me are that there is too much of the same sound throughout the album, which isn't a surprise as it is mostly produced by one producer in ColomBeyond. Best Tracks: Crate Diggaz, Best That I Can, Returnin' to Nam, Diamond, Anything Less, How Can You Be So Sure, Crac House, The Life of a Tape, The Real (Remix)