producers: the beatnuts

When The Beatnuts are in the house, restraint and decency has a day off. It's not even like these kids ever had their white underwear washed with a red shirt, and are wearing pick ish now. They will more likely shoot up the washing machine, smack the bitch that was doing the laundry and spend some serious dollars on getting new undies. So in short, these guys are no pussies, and are just not going out like that.

With the short "Intro", we are just getting the treat of being told what their names is, as the piano is actually rather cute on this, what then of course has to be changed as quickly as possible. And an inhaling sound then gets us to "It's Da Nuts", a bass based track, that is almost taking us back to the bareness of their early tracks. With Al Tariq being on board as well, we also got the classic threesome, that is using this cut to talk a whole lot of game, about them shortys, shorty looking as cheap as the marbles in the Williams sisters hair, shorty looking like she's knowing how to juggle all kinds of balls, "shorty looking like....enough of that". While the female voice is getting a little annoying, so isn't "Prendelo (Light It Up)" the best of tracks. The guitar / casio chords sound or whatever that is, definitely doesn't do it.

Much, and very very much better is "Contact", as JuJu and Les hook up something magnificent. There's a 'lalalal' in the back, and with the guitar and the happy mood, this will be played at a few million of summer parties as soon as the warmer weather breaks through the clouds. This might just become the "Big Pimpin'" of 2001. Keeping the guests coming, Marly Metal is on this cut, while Greg Nice is on the next cut, called "Yo Yo Yo". And he does his typical style of talking a whole lot, before he even cares to be saying something. The 'Nuts are kinda pissed on this, as they are doing a little bit of threatening here, again over a not really happening guitar. The latin flavor of this is just not happening, the 'Nuts are much better hooking up breaks. What they also should have done on "If It Ain't Gangsta", that features more of them packing lyrics, that Sean Black Attack is very happy to also spit.

While also not going their traditional route, "No Escapin' This" is still working very well. Once more Greg Nice is filling out the hype man position, while another 'lalala' female little singing is having this enter our head without even an instant of hesitation. Once more a definite club banger, without even remotely copying what others do to be bumped in a club. Of course the 'Nuts know how to talk shit, what they are contently doing on this track right here. That's as much bragging as it is congratulating themselves. We are then transported back to Halloween, with the eerie ghost like sounds of "Who's Comin Wit Da Shit Na", that features Willie Stubz, who's more than just happy to hang, and actually takes the chance to drop a rhyme very well fitting the voices and flows of the other two.

Still things then go very wrong with "Let's Git Doe" featuring scream master Fatman Scoop. While uptempo cuts usually are very appreciated, this is rather annoying, again the guitar just not cutting it, and while Scoop does have that voice to command us, this track just sounds like a 33 1/3 record played at 45. That's why we are quickly progressing to "Hood Thang", that takes us to a few seconds of movie like talking and street sounds, before the singing of Chris Chandler is crooning the chorus. Miss Loca is then grabbing the mic, opening the explicit growling, that JuJu and Les are happy to continue. However, compared to the next cut, we will rather be listening to that one, as with "Hammer Time" we get that classic Beatnuts sound again, that doesn't even need to be drastically updated to be very appealing today. The irony of this track is of course very wanted, and the energy this gets during the chorus is getting every jump around crowd in a frenzy. Ant the way the six people on here, this features Al Tariq, Problemz, Marly Metal and Bloody Moon, are giving the mic back and forth, makes this cut result in a success story.

And once again, the 'Nuts stray away from guitars and it was a good decision, as "U Don't Want It" featuring Triple Seis is one of the better cuts on this album here, that is utilized to cover the usual 'Nuts topics. And the short interlude type "Mayonnaise" is bringing back the classic Beatnuts style of doing things. A little slow to be rhyming over (what they still do), but if this album would have been once more kept to beats like this, we'd be raving and hooting and hollering about it. Then there's only "Se Acabo Remix" left, that features Method Man. Once more, no guitar, so once more, this is dope. The horns are slicing through this enormously and all three of them are doing their best braggadocios cheering.

On one track the Beatnuts claim that they make that type of sound, that makes the neighbors come knocking in a 'turn the music down' fashion. Well, at times you are tempted to rock this album to your stereo's limits. But at times you'll also be tempted to turn the level down, so to make sure that no one realizes that you are actually listening to this. That of course means that while some stuff on here is very dope, dope in the true fashion that we have come to expect from the Beatnuts, that usually deliver and don't need to find excuses about what went wrong that wasn't in their power. But at times, their package not only doesn't reach the supposed to receive it guy, it is already being destroyed in the post office.