producers: tony lyrical, j'palm, a-bomb

guests: mz.jackson

Tony Lyrical was one of the first that submitted a record to urbansmarts.com to review. So we got love for the cat. But not even the most love can have us give props to a record that's wack. Straight up..... hahhaha. You probably were expecting that on the rest of the review we will do some serious damage to the "Anthonology Volume 1: Evolution Of Man" record, but luckily Tony is offering us an album that is a further progression of the already cool last album.

Tony chose his name after his first alias Nonchalant was used by the lady who had this one hit a few years back. And thinking about what really represented him the best, 'lyrical' seemed to be the right word to add to his real life name, so he explains it on "Interview". Listening to the album, you will realize that the lyrics are carefully hand crafted, with saying much, while not depending on flashy and distracting styles, but remaining straight forward. Like his opening braggadocios "Remain Lyrical" is loaded with an effective flow, that allows lines like "the only 45 you blast are reprints on vinyl". The beat is properly working well too, as Tony and J'Palm are offering a smooth and open one. The song "Anti-Rap Thesis" is also working nicely, with some distorted singing in the back, a piano plucking, and the imagining verses, that conclude in the chorus "fuck this rap shit, I'd rather listen to classical hip hop". On here however, Tony has a flow that sounds similar to someone that we at this very moment can't put our finger on though.

While the opening dialogue of "Feminine Hygiene" is too long, once the beat comes on, we are forgetting about that quickly. The beat is somewhat reminiscing of an old westcoast funk type track, as only low piano keys are hit, and a guitar is adding further sounds to the cut. Production wise the most interesting cut is yet to come though, cause "Miranda" is getting a melody out of a siren, and that is added to a rolling beat and a deep bass. Tony is keeping the track dope with conscious rhymes, that are exposing the struggle. The orchestration and the extra static to the mirrored voice is making "Jerry Springer Syndrome" the second cut that actually has blow up potential, at least in true connoisseurs circles, while not in a club surrounding. Cause here the dope beat is again paired with worthwhile and deep lyrics, that are speaking from the heart and adding enormous amounts of relevance to the music. And on "GOD" Tony is again stepping to the mic with something to say, not to just say something. Here Tony puts on his sandals to do the pilgrimage into his own faith, over a well fitting guitar, that makes the cut musical.

But with us praising these cuts, we also gotta mention the ones that we don't really like. There's for example "Anger", a cut that is weak on the beat tip, and the lyrics expose in obvious ways Tony's often enough, but here especially, rather simplistic flow and rhymes. The beat on "Head Nod" by A-Bomb is rarely achieving us to do that, while the beat on "Mine Trip" is suffering from synthetic sounds. Further Mz. Jackson's singing on "Love Sexy" will easier annoy than please. Hence this album does suffer in some aspects, with the good aspects being able to overshadow them to a big part though.