Tropical Storm (Explicit)

by

Beenie Man

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The best thing that I can say about Tropical Storm is that it is probably the best sounding album that I have bought this year. I mean, the production here is top notch, including the Neptunes, and dancehall burner Dave Kelly, each on multiple tunes. Of course, as all the albums Beenie Man puts out on Virgin will be, Tropical Storm is a crossover attempt for Beenie Man, and based on the material that Beenie has done for his entire career, he certainly is entitled to have crossover attempts, and he does these type of records better than anyone in the dancehall.

As for the album itself, there are no bad tunes, although Fresh From Yard is kinda funny with Lil' Kim doing her best patois impersonation, but ultimately referring back to her usual clothes/car/jewelry type of flow. This is a crossover attempt, but Beenie didn't completely ignore the dance with his hit Ms. L.A.P., with Anthony Kelly on the board for that one. Also check the poorly titled Street Life, and the equally poorly titled Dave Kelly produced Gangsta Life, both are very good tunes, Gangsta Life, being one of my favorite on the album, its a pure head knocker from Madhouse, as always. My absolute favorite tune is Bossman with Sean Paul, and the Empress Lady Saw, a Neptunes production, that has somewhat of a dancehall feel to it. Also really like Yagga Yo, Party Hard, Bad Girl, Pure Pretty Gal, You Babe, and I even like Feel It Boy, with Janet Jackson. Overall, I've had this album for about a week, and I don't really like hip-hop anymore, but I've played it for friends that do like hip-hop and they really enjoy it: Of course Beenie's fans are going to get it, but if you're a hip-hop head, you might like this one as well in your collection. Also, on the dancehall side, bigup to Beenie for basically ignoring all the war stuff which has hit dancehall hard in the last year, he never calls out any name, and also bigup to Bounty Killer as they have suposedly squashed their conflict (I know its happened before, but I think they mean it this time). Pick this one up, unless you're expecting a straight dancehall project, you won't be dissapointed.