1.A New Beginning
2.The Backstory feat. Bilal Salaam
3.Trouble Makers
4.The Ring feat. Jazz, Wordsworth & Invincible
5.Fly Love Song feat. 5ela
6.Life Lesson
7.Frequency Interlude
8.Family Portrait
9.Eye Of The Beholder feat. Invincible & Elzhi
10.The Bigger Picture feat. Supastition
11.All About Us feat. Necro Redd
12.Closing Remarks
13.One Sound Two Feet (bonus)
14.History feat. Spiryt (bonus)
So, before A Pipe Dream and a Promise came Develop. I'll be honest - I overlooked this for quite some time. I had downloaded and heard a few tracks before I listened to his '09 album, but I never cared. It held no weight to me. But my ear was tuned differently. Our sounds, tastes mature. And Finale's latest album tuned me into this one. It's kinda weird, but this feels like a follow-up album. A Pipe Dream and a Promise had a balls-out feel to it, especially in the production. The production on Develop is a lot more mellow - not worse, just not as engaging. Since it's all done by Spier 1200 (who, may I add, only worked on this project - he's done nothing else in music as far as I know), it's got a very cohesive sound on it, which adds to the experience a little bit, but again, it's kinda standard undergroundish beats for me. Lyrically, Finale was as strong here as he was in '09, the only thing that really changed is his content, which on his debut here was more conscious if you wanna use that term...I'll just say there's a lot less braggadocio and more humility. I will say that the first thing that stood out to me is how much his voice changed, or at least the way he rhymes on the mic - he's a lot clearer and easier to understand here, on A Pipe Dream you kinda gotta strain your ear a bit to extract the full meaning. So overall, it's quite good, just a bit of an easier listen than in '09.
Sample Tracks
"The Backstory"
"Eye of the Beholder"
"Closing Remarks"
Best tracks: "The Backstory", "Life Lesson", "Eye of the Beholder", "The Bigger Picture", "Closing Remarks", "One Sound Two Feet"
Not-so-great: "All About Us"
Beats & Production: 8/10
Rhymes & Lyricism: 8.5/10
Originality & Creativity: 8/10
Overall Grade: 82%
Download
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Finale & Spier 1200 - Develop
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2 comments:
I strongly disagree. I think this is probably the best hip-hop album of the last 3 years. I think Spier's beats are mellow AND engaging, just beautiful but thumping at the same time. And not only are Finale's lyrics honest and well thought out, but the guest appearances from Elzhi and Invincible are incredible. Also, for the record, Spier 1200 is/was part of the group 2for5 and just put out a full-length with another 1/3 of that group, Oktober. Do your homework, dude. Sadly though, that album is pretty boring production-wise. Love your blog but I really think Develop deserves much more praise.
Spier 1200 has a this year's collaboration with Oktober Zero!
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