![\"dj_envy\"](\"http:\/\/www.musoscribe.com\/images\/dj_envy.jpg\")
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On first listen, my attention was grabbed by a track (or “skit,” as it’s called on the disc) in which a character named DJ Death Murder Homicide rattles off every gangsta clich\u00e9 while recording his latest joint. The recording ends, and it is quickly (and amusingly) revealed that Mr. Homicide is a total phony; one can picture him in a Polo shirt and khakis. The Co-op<\/i> contains two more of these “Keeping it 2 Real” skits, forming a brief narrative.<\/p>\n
An album built around this idea would be intriguing: examine the posturing and artifice of rap, and expose it as such, all while entertaining. But that’s not exactly what we have here. Juxtaposed as they are, the remaining dozen-or-so tracks are an exercise in irony. Many tracks (“School of Hard Knocks,” “What it Be Like,” “Move Like a G”) trade in just the sort of macho rap shibboleths skewered on the “Keeping it 2 Real” tracks. The shopworn guest-star practice is employed here: among others, we get Fabolous, Styles P and Remy Martin. Too many “yo, it’s me, DJ Envy in da house”-style intros waste the listener’s time. We know who you are, gentlemen; your names couldn’t be any bigger on the album cover.<\/p>\n
Oddly, the album improves as it spins. The standard-issue rap “Shakedown 4 Life” has a worthwhile musical backing. The same can be said of “Things You Do” (featuring Nina Sky, which of course she tells you<\/i>) and “Invincible.” The album ends with its best track, “Mr. Lover,” but even then it reiterates every hip-hop bromide (in case you missed any).<\/p>\n
As far as we know, there is no truth to the rumor that the duo will continue DJ Death Murder Homicide’s exploits on a followup entitled The Post-Op<\/i>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On first listen, my attention was grabbed by a track (or “skit,” as it’s called on the disc) in which a character named DJ Death Murder Homicide rattles off every […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,65],"tags":[2496,2497],"class_list":["post-9286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hip-hop","category-review","tag-dj-envy","tag-red-cafe","cat-36-id","cat-65-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9286"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9286\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9287,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9286\/revisions\/9287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}