His album boasts a feature from Eminem and production from Dr Dre, but was the six year gap since his last album worth the wait? Riky Bains grabs a pair of headphones and a drink and finds out, Bottoms Up.
Playing to his fondness for the odd beverage every now and then, Obie Trice bills his new album Bottoms Up. This album has the toughness of hard liquor combined with the elegance and pizzazz of a matured port. Trice takes the consumer from bar to bar offering catchy choruses and an almost revolutionary spirit from the Motor City MC who returns to the spotlight when the album hits digital shelves April 3. Absolutely worth purchasing, I'm convinced that Bottoms Up will become a 'must have' for the hip hop connoisseur.
Trice, whose relationship with Eminem after leaving Shady Records in 2008 remains dignified, recruits some terrifyingly talented button pushers to produce the instantly recognisable Obie Trice style. Eminem produces one song and features on the highly anticipated Richard. Producers Statik Selektah and Phonix Beats truly deliver. He has never been one to shy away from collaborations, that's for sure, and you can check the credits on his christening album Cheers for evidence of that. However, it is great to see that Obie has put himself at the forefront of this project. These are his lyrical contributions, this is his content and his creation. This is his album, it's Obie Trice in his most exposed form; free from the shackles of his former major label home.
Artist: Obie Trice
Album: Bottom's Up
Label: Black Market Entertainment
Release Date: 3rd April 2012
Total Time: 01:00:19
Tracks: 17
Previous Album: Second Round's On Me
The whole record has a revolutionary, triumphant feel to it; right from the Intro [produced by Dr. Dre] which gives the listener 'feel-good' flavour with its potent piano and percussion blend. Any doubts or cynical assumptions of anti-climax are discarded from the off, Obie Trice is well and truly back on the podium. What he does particularly well is cater for a menu of moods; there are songs to just dance to, to reminisce to, to bop your head and screw-face to...a lot of artists today are predictable and before you've even heard their new music, you can almost anticipate what it will sound like and the kind of vocals or instrumentals they'll use. Obie takes this modern theme of monotony and massacres it using a machine gun loaded with melodies, colourful charismatic vocab and a trunk full of subject matter. Regardless of what he's rapping about, this project has that gutter authentic vibe to it which only certified classic-creators can employ.
The creativity in the choruses evokes memories of a pre-2005 50 Cent, if you enjoy those catchy note-shifting hooks crammed with street cred then Bottoms Up is for you, the album has bundles of it. He's also got bundles of what I like to call 'rhythmic spontaneity', which is my way of saying that he's great at flowing to the beat but then switching it up with pleasant surprises of internal rhyme; Trice has a knack of doing this quite often. This is one of the many attributes of this renaissance rapper which demonstrates his maturity and experience. While he may not have had his fair share of the limelight- Obie is certainly no new kid on the block.
If you told me this album was released in 2002 I would not bat an eyelid, it wouldn't be extraordinary. The fact that this is a 2012 release is what makes it that little bit more special, because Obie has managed to take a classic sound and blend it effortlessly into a the modern and relevant tone.
Words by Riky Bains [Real name, no gimmicks] [thisisriky.co.uk]
Rating: 4.5/5
Tracks to Check: BME Up [can't help but rewind this track when it finishes]
Tracks to Avoid: N/A
Reason for Buying: Obie Trice is back with a vengeance
Reason for Binning: N/A
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