Pete Rock - Soul Survivor II (May 11, 2004)

First of all, I want to thank my two readers that continue to check on my more-and-more-dwindling-in-update-frequency blog. I realize that not posting for a week and a half is like an eternity for some, so I appreciate everyone who visits. Of course, if there were more comments on my posts, I may find more time in my day for the write-ups instead of trivial things such as breathing and sleeping, but that's just my observation.

(*cough* Leave some damn comments! *cough*)

Anyway, Peter Phillips, also known as Pete Rock One Of The Greatest Hip Hop Producers Of All Time (yes, that's his full rap name), decided to capitalize on the underground and critical success of his first solo album, Soul Survivor, by waiting six years to release a sequel. Since his original home base, the almighty Loud Records, folded, Soul Survivor II was released on BBE Records, an imprint that was an acronym for 'Barely Breaking Even', which is probably a very optimistic assessment on the performance of this disc.

There are several reasons why Soul Survivor II failed to push as many copies as the original recipe. For starters, the music itself is completely different: PR quietly decided to switch up seemingly his entire style for this album, with only a few of the tracks hitting the mark for folks (like myself) who loved his earlier work. He also made the conscious decision not to actually appear that often on his own album: unlike Classic Soul Survivor, Pete is content to remain behind the boards, providing an occasional chorus here and one verse there, as if he were trying to make the definitive East Coast version of The Chronic. Pete Rock also fished from a pool of lesser-known artists as guests, instead of high-profile acts such as Method Man and Big Punisher, who graced the earlier album.

Soul Survivor II is one of those albums that most Pete Rock fans have no information about, even though he is one of the most loved producers on the network of hip hop blogs. (I see you, Dan Love.) I had originally given this a spin back in 2004, but quickly forgot about it: I can tell you right now, without you having read any of the actual write-up, that the songs on this CD don't grab you like "Tru Master" and "Strange Fruit" did on Soul Survivor 1.0. However, it was time to bring it out of my crates for an update. Here's hoping that it will serve a better function than as a makeshift shiv in my next movie.

1. TRUTH IS (FEAT BLACK ICE)
I still don't trust rap albums that start with spoken word poets. I think it stems from that time where a rap album that started with a spoken word intro played me for twenty bucks in 3-Card Monty. Ever since then...

2. WE GOOD (FEAT KARDINAL OFFISHALL)
At this point, I've only heard two Kardinal songs: "Bakardi Slang", which I happen to like, and the Canadian remix to the Wu-Tang Clan's "Careful (Click, Click)". He comes off OK on a beat that sounds as much like Pete Rock as my writings read like Tolstoy.

3. JUST DO IT (FEAT PHAROAHE MONCH)
I can't be counted as one of the biggest Pharoahe Monch fans, and this song certainly won't win him any new listeners. The beat actually sounds worse than the lyrics, if you can even fathom the possibility.

4. GIVE IT TO YA (FEAT LITTLE BROTHER & DARIEN BROCKINGTON)
This is the most conventional PR beat so far, if by "conventional" you read "can be considered to be a little bit too chilled-out, since it almost put me to sleep". Which is a shame, because I like Little Brother about twenty-nine percent of the time.

5. IT'S DA POSTABOY (FEAT POSTABOY)
I can't help but have a felling that Postaboy is one of those rappers that the rap dorks on Boxden claimed I was "supposed" to check for seven years ago. Of course, I conveniently failed to do so, because life is fucking short. Suffice it to say I am not very impressed, and that's probably the reason why I haven't heard anything new from Postaboy since.

6. IT'S A LOVE THING (FEAT C.L. SMOOTH & DENOSH)
C.L. may be "the best that ever did it on a Pete Rock track", but that doesn't automatically make this song a good one.

7. ONE MC ONE DJ (FEAT SKILLZ)
This beat is half amazing, half annoying-as-fuck. The formerly mad Skillz sounds fantastic as always, though, so chalk one up in the "win" column.

8. BEEF (FEAT KRUMBSNATCHA)
The hook is awful. Krumbsnatcha, who frequently rents himself out as a successful rapper for parties, comes off as decent enough. This track may have made for a much better listening experience, though, if Pete Rock and friends weren't afraid to stray from the "verse/hook/verse/hook/verse/hook" format that makes most hip hop fans long for those nine-minute epics by Grandmaster Flash, Man Parrish, and Afrika Bambataa.

9. NO TEARS (FEAT LEELA JAMES)
This song sounds like an outtake from the original Soul Survivor sessions. This is a good thing.

10. HEAD RUSH (FEAT GZA/GENIUS & THE RZA)
Pete Rock tries his best True Master imitation, which is a very questionable move for being one of the best hip hop producers of all time. That said, this track isn't bad, but I hesitate in calling it a "song", since it clocks in at barely over two minutes.

11. FLY TILL I DIE (FEAT TALIB KWELI & C.L. SMOOTH)
Don't get too excited: C.L. only appears on the chorus. Kweli sounds incredibly meh; for the first time on Soul Survivor II, I actually prefer the beat to the rhymes.

12. WARZONE (FEAT DEAD PREZ)
This is the least-sounding PR song I have ever heard. I can do without the constant repetition of the phrase "in the club", but otherwise, this song rocks.

13. DA VILLA (FEAT SLUM VILLAGE)
Someone (sorry, I forget who) had requested that I review some Slum Village on my blog. It's in my pile, which seems to be growing taller as each day passes, but in regard to this track, all I can say is meh.

14. N----Z KNOW (FEAT J DILLA)
This would be the track where PR actually drops a rhyme. Even though this is his CD and all, I can't say that I've missed his verses one bit. J Dilla, R.I.P.

15. APPRECIATE (FEAT C.L. SMOOTH)
Now this is more like it! Why the hell can't they work out their differences? Nobody actually wants to hear C.L. Smooth without PR, so why does he even pretend otherwise?

FINAL THOUGHTS: Soul Survivor II is a completely different listening experience when compared to his first solo album. That said, it's nowhere near as good as Soul Survivor. The beats aren't catchy, save for a handful: the guests come off as uninspired, or in the case of Postaboy, completely out of place. Supposedly Pete Rock is about to release an album that is solely collaborations with New York-based artists: maybe that CD will sound more like how we all expected this one to be. Oddly, one of the most enjoyable aspects of Soul Survivor II is the fact that Pete included snippets of beats as musical interludes, and these beats all sound as if they were from a discarded early version of this project. In no way am I saying this is a bad album: I would prefer to listen to this every day for the rest of my life if that meant rappers like U-God and Memphis Bleek would leave the public consciousness. And it is entirely possible that we may all appreciate this album in about twenty years. But when compared to Soul Survivor, well...

BUY OR BURN? Since this is a Pete Rock album, I'm tempted to advise everyone to make the purchase simply to support Pete Rock; if my two readers actually did this, you would be doing the world a great service. But simply put, this album only has a handful of good songs, so a burn would be most appropriate.

BEST TRACKS: "Warzone"; "One MC One DJ"; "Appreciate"

-Max

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