Jay-Z - In My Lifetime, Vol. 1 (1997)
Man.. I really like this Jay-Z fellow to the point where I freestyle in the shower with my eyes closed, trying to imagine myself freestyling for him right after a concert circa 1997, him being blown away and signing me because I rhymed his name with "crazy" and "lazy" before hitting him with the "hazy" like a hidden knife in a crowd. In my fantasies, he jumps over the red velvet rope separating us, and he says "YOU KNOW WHAT?! FUCK TRACK THREE, WE RE-RELEASING THE ALBUM WITH YOU ON IT INSTEAD, I ALWAYS KNEW THAT TRACK WAS TRASH, BUT THE ILLUMINA-" and then he's sniped in the shoulder, I save him, nurse him back to health, expose the Illuminati that every backpacker is sure that Jay-Z is associated with, and Jay-Z, in return, proceeds to re-release this album with me on a brand new third track instead, leaving behind "I Know What Girls Like (feat. Puff Daddy & Lil' Kim)" and its absolutely God-awful hook behind in the past, almost as if it were just some fever dream that Brooklyn experienced as a collective whole twenty years ago that no one bares speaking of now,believing that they were the only ones. What I'm trying to get across is that there's a really great sci-fi movie that you could make out of this scenario, and maybe I could outdo Jay-Z on a track called "Bamboozled (feat. CurbChron)" where people will use the term "Bamboozled" instead of "Renegade" due to it.
This album is pretty interesting to listen to, if anything, to see just how different his general mindset is compared to "Reasonable Doubt" which was released just the year before, but in that time, Jay-Z enjoyed a bit of success and his buddy Notorious B.I.G. died (spoiler alert if y'all just got unfrozen from some military freezing project and were hoping to listen to your favorite rapper from NYC, I guess) so the general attitude on here strikes me less of "my life is fucking shit" and more like "I gotta take over this fuckin' rap game while I've got the chance", but don't get me wrong, there's still a lot of awesome social commentary, especially in the AMAZING final two tracks "Where I'm From" (“Where we call the cops ‘the A-Team’ / ‘Cause they hop out of vans and spray things / Where life expectancy is so low that we making our wills at 18”) and "You Must Love Me" (holy fuck, he sounded like he was about to cry when describing selling his mother crack, incredibly depressing shit) which take you straight back to those cold streets he first introduced you to on "Reasonable Doubt", but likeI said, most of the album kinda strikes me more as Jay-Z realizing what opportunity he had, and trying to grasp onto it like a man grabbing onto a lifesaver while drowning. Jay-Z is still one cold motherfucker, but yeah.. There are some odd moments on this album that haven't aged too well.
When listening to this album for the first time, I told my friend "Holy fuck, have you heard "(Always Be My) Sunshine (feat. Babyface and Foxy Brown)"? This is the absolute worst fucking beat I could ever imagine Jay-Z going over" and then just a minute later "..THIS WAS A FUCKING SINGLE?!" because WHAT THE FUCK. You know what's a track that makes me feel like I'm in "Scarface", though? It'd be weird if you did, but "The City Is Mine (feat. Blackstreet)" is such a fucking cool song to me: It sounds like it came straight outta the '80s with a fresh line of cocaine remaining under its nose, and that hook works so much better than you'd initially expect, especially when it's complimented by a nice little funky beat, which brings me to my next point: Sure, "Reasonable Doubt" had some classic beats on it, but I feel like this album has even better, more varied beats for Jay-Z to slay, and I gotta say.. Yeah, I think a good portion of the time, I actually dig this album more than the previous, I just feel like it's generally more consistent even if it's not that far-removed quality-wise, and I know that'll get me crucified one day when I'm running for president and people find my awful writings, but the beats on the previous album really fit the grim nature of the lyrics, while this album generally just sounds better in my headphones in 2017, even if it sounds just as dated as the previous album, but really: Crunchier snares, groovier bass that's more prominent in the mix, everything just sounds better to -me-. Good shit.
7/10
__________________
Feel free to read other reviews and perhaps buy this album via my Amazon Associates link!
Click here to listen to this FOR FREE on Spotify! WOW! HOT DAMN!
Read about this album on Wikipedia! Great stuff to read while on the toilet! Yeah!
