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I grew up listening to hip hop on cassette. This was back when 2Pac was still alive. I loved Dr. Dre's "The Chronic" like no other album at the time and it remains one of my all-time favorites. When I got into my later teens though- maybe 18 years old or so- I took the switch to punk rock. I found Fabolous and Nas in the late 1990's/early 2000's but otherwise I've had an on and off relationship with hip hop because I feel like, on a mainstream level at least, it just doesn't have what it once did. And I think it would be fair to say that Big Shug agrees with me, though he is the rapper and I am the writer so perhaps I should say that I agree with him.
These songs have a great flow to the rhymes and they take me back to that time of Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, 2Pac and even Biz Markie. It can be hard, like gangsta, or as he likes to say at one point "soul music with a hip hop twist". As it pays homage to the hip hop of my youth, back when rap music was just all around excellent, there is a little something modern in here, even if it comes out by way of Nas.
The guest spots are right on and Big Shug brings something to this that only he can deliver. On the song "All In" he says "You original but you sound like him" and I think a lot of that is true in hip hop nowadays, where you think of how good one of these mainstream rappers is and yet it's only because they sound so much like somebody else. Big Shug makes it clear on "Triple OGzus" that he is pulling no punches and like Frank Sinatra said, he is going to do it his way.
If you are a fan of hip hop- and I mean real hip hop- or you've always just been curious as to what the appeal of it might be, then I suggest you listen to "Triple OGzus" as it is quite possibly the finest hip hop album of 2015 if not all time. They just do not make 'em like this anymore and it is a damn shame.
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