Bonus Post #4

Let's continue the day with another female artist whose career directly ties in with that of Jay-Z. And when I tell you that this post won't be about Foxy Brown (because I've written about her debut already...well, sort of), that really only leaves but one option.


Amil - All Money Is Legal (September 19, 2000)

I always found the Amil story both depressing and pretty standard-issue for the music industry. The rapper born Amil Whitehead was discovered as a part of a group called Major Coins, who you two have never heard anything from: the only reason you’ve even heard of that crew name in your lifetime is because Amil was credited as “Amil from Major Coins” on her major label debut, contributing a guest verse to Jay-Z’s “Can I Get A…”, a song recorded for the Rush Hour soundtrack (that also featured Ja Rule, a fact I include so that you two don’t suddenly believe that I’d forgotten about his existence). The song was a sizeable hit, which led to Amil snagging a solo record deal with Roc-A-Fella / Def Jam, the label home of both Jay-Z and his boys Memphis Bleek and Beanie Sigel. I’m not sure if this deal led to the dissolution of Major Coins, or if the group had already disbanded when Amil recorded her guest verse (which was originally offered to one of her friends in the group), but the point is that this course of action led her to be the lone female on the label (as Rihanna didn’t sign her contract until a few years later).

Hov quickly formed the quartet The Dynasty, and set about building his artists. Aside from the obvious gains made by Bleek and Sigel, Amil also took advantage of the opportunity, landing guest appearances on various Jay-Z projects, all while setting the stage for her solo debut, A.M.I.L. (All Money Is Legal), which I’m only going to call All Money Is Legal from this point on. The four artists collaborated frequently enough, as they all had other shit to do, but a mild buzz was still generating, at least on the east coast, where they all were based. Amil used this buzz to her advantage, unleashing her debut with the full backing of Roc-A-Fella and Def Jam.

And then… nothing. All Money Is Legal failed to move any units, even with its A-list guest stars. Now we all know that every group Jay-Z is affiliated with tends to fall apart: The Commission was written off after the passing of The Notorious B.I.G.; The Murderers (a trio featuring DMX, Ja Rule, and Hov) ended having released only a single song, forcing Ja to rebrand a new crew as Murder Inc. in an effort to save face. And we’ve all seen what’s happened to The Throne. (I'm not counting The Carters as that group involves his wife, so it would be considerably more difficult for him to plan an exit, and besides, Bey is more famous than he is.) So it wasn’t shocking to me when Shawn’s plan for a Dynasty album quietly became his own The Dynasty: Roc La Familia, released a month later. A collaboration-heavy solo project where Bleek and Beans were handed multiple guest spots, Amil was only invited to participate on one fucking song. She left the label soon afterward, taking retail jobs to support herself while trying to break back into the business.

All Money Is Legal isn’t the first Roc-A-Fella project to bomb at the box office, but all signs point to Amil never being given a fair shot here. Most of you two are only going to be familiar with one or two of her cameo spots, if that, so it’s clear that Hova’s marketing strategy of keeping her in the background while recording his own music by himself isn’t one that should be adopted by anyone who thrives on collaboration. But unlike the vast majority of you two, Amil Whitehead has a rap album that was distributed by Def Jam Records, so no matter how her summer internship goes, she’ll always have that to fall back on as a talking point.

1. SMILE 4 ME

So right off the bat, I have an issue with how All Money Is Legal was sequenced. “Smile 4 Me”, an EZ Elpee production, is far too slow of a song to hook the listener into giving a shit about the rest of the album. I applaud Amil for not caving in to the rap album intro trope, but “Smile 4 Me” is about persevering in the face of really fucking goddamn depressing odds: I walked away from this feeling bad for our host, even though a lot of the choices she made on here were her own fault. This really should have appeared closer to the end of the project, or better yet, in a vault or banished to a hard drive collecting dust in someone’s attic. This is exactly the type of song that makes one question why they picked this album to write about in the first place. At least Amil shows a bit of range with the subject matter, I suppose.

2. I GOT THAT (FEAT. BEYONCÉ)

This was clearly intended for at least radio airwaves, if not nightclubs, and I’m not just saying that because of the Beyoncé guest feature. L.E.S. and the Trackmasters aim for the middle ground between Puff Daddy and Jermaine Dupri with their Gwen Guthrie-sampling instrumental, which sounds incomplete at best, with some musical elements mixed way louder than our host, who is back on her shit-talking game on here. “I Got That” also isn’t a good song, but it works a teensy bit better than “Smile 4 Me”, if only because this is obviously the same Amil that appeared on Jay-Z’s “Can I Get A…”. Speaking of Hov, he has a writing credit on “I Got That”: my assumption is that he wrote Bey’s hook, but I really don’t care to look into it further. Let’s move on, folks.

3. GET DOWN

Producer Jon-John manages to pair a guitar loop sample with the worst possible drums he could find on his computer, I assume, which is a shame, as the opening notes lend “Get Down” a bit of promise it never gets the opportunity to live up to. Amil uses “Get Down” to display some versatility in her flow, opting to both rap and kind-of sing on this song-length “are we fucking or what?”-type come-on. This is the best song on All Money Is Legal thus far, but that isn’t saying a whole lot, as Amil’s rapped verse destroys any charm or goodwill the rest of the track has earned up to that point, and again, it wasn’t a winner in the first place. But “Get Down” should be listened to at least the one time, if only to understand why this project exists in the first place.

4. Y’ALL DEAD WRONG

The problem with Amil’s voice is that she’s too flat, weak, and indistinct to ever hold court over your typical rap beat. Name one song where our host was the standout. You can’t. “Y’all Dead Wrong” is a prime example of this issue, as Amil is buried alive amid the bleeps and bloops of the generic Rockwilder club-ready instrumental. She’s also fairly monotone, which isn’t usually a concern of mine (Foxy Brown falls into this category, too, and lest we all forget the late Guru), but her lack of inflection when she’s obviously trying to convey some sort of feeling is distracting at best. So far, it seems like a little bit of Amil is the way to go on any song that happens to feature her.

5. HEARD IT ALL (FEAT. JAY-Z)

Hov finally steps out from behind the curtain for the Just Blaze-produced “Heard It All”, and it’s the disrespectful-to-mean Jay-Z that we haven’t heard from for quite a while. (To a point, anyway: he does apologize halfheartedly at the end of his long-ass verse.) Amil and her label boss each try to claim that the opposite sex is only after one thing, playing into extremely broad stereotypes in lieu of writing compelling lyrics. The beat is wack as fuck (Justin was just getting started here), and neither artists sounds especially inspired by the subject matter. Bleh.

6. QUARRELS (FEAT. CARL THOMAS)

So far, all of the production on All Money Is Legal is as little and flat as our host’s voice. Was this Amil’s own doing, or did Hov block her from purchasing actual hot beats? The world may never know. Although “Quarrels” features motherfucking Carl Thomas, so obviously this was never considered to be a song about our host battling her opponents in the rap game: rather, this is a song about a fractured relationship. Or something: Amil quotes some of Prodigy’s lyrics from LL Cool J’s “I Shot Ya (Remix)” toward the end rather nonsensically. I’m not really sure what it was I just listened to, and I’m pretty sure not even Amil could explain this one properly to anyone.

7. GIRLFRIEND

The “blackmail” song of sorts, on which our host threatens her man that she’ll tell his significant other about their regular dalliances if he doesn’t do… well, she isn’t super clear with the message here, because at one point she expresses concern that if he is cheating on his girl, he could later cheat on her, and, well, duh. Not sure what the point of this exercise was, but it sucked, and Rockwilder’s production didn’t help. It’s songs like “Girlfriend” that lead people to incorrectly assume that all female rappers talk about is sex and relationships. Groan.

8. ALL MONEY IS LEGAL (A.M.I.L.)

Although this title track still isn’t very good, Ty Fyffe’s beat wasn’t bad. It’s certainly the most authentically lively instrumental of the evening so far, unlike Rockwilder’s artificial club joints. For her part, Amil does get back to her gruff shit-talking on here, so the fact that she doesn’t sound anywhere close to convincing is a troublesome development. Playing up her connection to Jay-Z, Beanie Sigel, and hell, even Memphis Bleek on this track draws parallels that only hang a lantern on this album’s overt flaws: even Bleek has some good songs in his back catalog. Yeah, I just said that.

9. THAT’S RIGHT (FEAT. JAY-Z)

Unlike “Heard It All”. Just Blaze manages to inject some energy into the proceedings on “That’s Right”, which sounds a bit like a reject from the recording sessions for The Dynasty: Roc La Familia until Hova and Amil deliver the opening chorus. “That’s Right” is typical generic Jay-Z lazy braggadocio masked as a disturbing come-on: during his part of the hook, he promises to buy a potential paramour a car once she learns “how to drive”, which begs the follow-up: just how young are these ladies supposed to be, Shawn? Aside from that bit of perviness on the guest’s part, “That’s Right” is an extension of “Can I Get A…”, except without Ja Rule and it’s terrible. Not that the addition of Jay would have helped any, but.

10. ANYDAY

Kind of weird, in that I didn’t hate “Anyday” at all. K-Rob’s instrumental is bizarre, incorporating an accordion sample and some creepy-adjacent chanting during the hook, but the ingredients combine to form a beat that grew on me pretty quickly, and to her credit, Amil sounded pretty decent over it, at least when her boasts-n-bullshit weren’t getting actively trampled over by said accordion sample. Kind of late to show real effort now, Amil, but at least All Money Is Legal won’t be a complete wash.

11. RAW

Meh.

12. NO 1 CAN COMPARE

So at what point in his initial listen do you think Jay-Z realized that All Money Is Legal wouldn’t appeal to any audience? Asking for a friend.

13. 4 DA FAM (FEAT. JAY-Z, MEMPHIS BLEEK, & BEANIE SIGEL)

One hundred percent the track which anyone that bothered to pick up All Money Is Legal immediately skipped to, and likely the only song anyone actually remembers from the project. Not so much because it’s good (it’s merely okay), but because of the guest list. This Dynasty posse cut, included solely to goose the sales numbers, has a Ty Fyffe instrumental that sounds like it’s better than it truly is, strutting around in an ill-fitting suit it knows it can’t afford. Bleek and Beans serve their purpose, Memphis with a verse that exists while Sigel claims to “attract dykes”, which sounded stupid back in 2000 and is even worse now. Amil doesn’t have to carry this one, so her performance on “4 Da Fam” is pretty entertaining, if a bit stiff. But this is the Hova show, as Shawn Corey Carter drops a fire verse (the best of the entire project, no lie) chock-full of bars that would later be turned into sound bites and sampled for other, better tracks. No surprises there: Jay-Z doesn’t like to be shown up by anyone signed to his label. Ah well, at least we’re done.

FINAL THOUGHTS: I make fun of Jay-Z’s tendency to not play well with others signed to his own label, mostly because he is fucking terrible at promoting anyone who isn’t selling as well as himself (this is why he worked so well with Kanye West, at least until recently, and Rihanna), but All Money Is Legal isn’t solely his fault. To his credit, he seems to have given his young charge free reign to write and record the album she wanted: the problem is that the album she wanted is awful and didn’t need to be recorded in the first place. All Money is Legal is thirteen tracks filled with flat, disaffected bars delivered by a rapper that never quite grasped that her strength was in short cameo bursts, as the longer format a full song utilizes exposes her as someone who didn’t have a lot of ideas in the first place. Most of the beats are terrible, and aside from Hov’s own guest verse at the very end of the project, every performer on All Money Is Legal is doing the absolute bare minimum to earn their paycheck, and, sadly, Amil is thrown to the wolves, both in that she wasn’t ready for this level of exposure at the time, and also after the project’s release, where Jay and company tried to forget that she was ever a part of the Roc-A-Fella story to begin with. I sincerely hope the royalty checks Amil earns from “Can I Get A…” still receiving radio airplay provides her with enough to give her some bragging rights, because there is no reason that cameo should have ever led to All Money is Legal.

BUY OR BURN? Neither, really. Not even a stream is that necessary. I’ve likely made your lives a little bit worse by alerting you to the existence of this album. Sorry bout it.

BEST TRACKS: “4 Da Fam”; “Anyday”

-Max