Another few months, another T-Rock/T-Rock affiliated album. I'm not complaining though, as he is my favourite artist who consistently puts out material. However, on average, these compilation type of releases from T-Rock and the Rock Solid Label haven't been as crisp as many of his recent solo albums. This one has grown on me after a few spins but still lacks the real punch his solo albums often have. T-Rock's new R&B signing Kehoa offers something different on the album. It opens with a fiery verse from T-Rock, then Smoke straight away after that. It would have been better separating these because Kehoa's singing verses blend in too much with her hook and it almost gets boring, but has enough going for it. Elsewhere, the Rem Steele (sounds like a wrestler's name or something) songs 'Inhale and Pause' and 'A Peace of Mind', taken from Remsteele's 'Cities Been Raped' are quality with the former being my pick from the disc (T-Rock does these vibey smoke songs well), and the latter features Kool and The Gang's 'Little Children' sample best known to hip hop fans as being in AZ's 'Happy Ho Jackie'. Lil Tec's 'Another Day' is another one worth mentioning featuring a good hook and beat. The only things that kind of fail to work are the posse song 'The Gunline' taken from last year's 'Revelations' by Smoke that goes on a touch too long and 'Shed Some Blood', that while featuring a catchy chorus, fails with the beat and verses. 3-3.5/5 Best Tracks: Inhale and Pause, Another Day, Gotta Go, A Peace of Mind.

Another unknown worthy West Coast release, so much so, that O.Z. wasn't even in the database. While there isn't much original here, OZ is a good quick rapper who sounds a touch like one of the Bones at times, and the beats are quality G-Funk that was popular in the mid '90s. Best Tracks: OZ, All I Really Want, Runnin They Mouth, Recognize and Realize

The first half a dozen songs are mostly made up of solid east coast beats with fire rhyming. 'Numerical Slaughter' is a twist on Papoose's earlier 'Alphabetical Slaughter'. You can probably guess what the difference is from the titles. While some of the bars are debatable, '3rd Eye' features more of the depth of political content that Cube should've had on 'Everythangs Corrupt'. 'BAG' is another decent one where Biggie is sampled. From there it switches to pop-rap. 'The Golden Child' and 'Precious Jewel' are about Pap's newborn child and his wife, Remy Ma. The former is fairly sappy but I don't dislike it. My main issue with it is that Remy doesn't sound sentimental. Papoose does, Remy doesn't. Then 'Discipline' has links to Papoose's upbringing. To finish the album 'S.H.O.O.T.E.R.' and 'Mash the Gas on 'Em' take it back to the album's earlier sound but aren't as strong. As with his past projects, the rapping is mostly fire, he is a great rapper but on the whole the beats aren't noteworthy or unique. With producers like DJ Premier, E-Dubb, Pete Rock, Statik Selektah and Ron Browz providing beats the sound we've got here doesn't surprise. Beats: ★★☆ Bars: ★★★★ Hooks: ★★★ Best Tracks: Underrated, Numerical Slaughter, 3rd Eye, God MC

Papoose can spit. Everyone knows that. On his best songs he has bars, a dope flow and commands attention with his voice. But some of the beats on this probably would have felt dated if this dropped when it was originally supposed to six years ago. 2.5-3/5

When I started to get into music more around 2004 I remember listening to Gigolo a fair bit. I'd been getting into Kells, who produces and is a feature on two of these songs ('Gigolo' and 'You'), and I enjoyed that pop rap tune back in the day. So years later I finally come to check out the album. Nick isn't much of a rapper, but is comfortably listenable, however, he does perhaps try to sound a bit too hard at times, as he does on the album art when you look at what he does for a day job, but most of this is about the chicks. The beats aren't too bad either, with a few featuring some well-known samples ('Attitude'-Newcleus' 'Jam on It') and Nick had a good idea in keeping the album to only twelve songs. The weakest portion of this album is 'My Rib' to 'Main Girl' that fail to be worth listening to twice, but the rest is alright if you can stand pop rap. Overall, it's a pretty generic pop rap album, but if it was by Alan Smithee and not Nick Cannon, it wouldn't have the horrendous rep it does from some. Best Tracks: Gigolo, You, My Mic, Your Pops Don't Like Me (I Really Don't Like This Dude)