Album Review: DJ Drama - Third Power

Album Review: DJ Drama – Third Power

Posted On: October 12, 2011
Posted By: odeisel
Comments: 1

By Odeisel

Drama is chaos to some. Others thrive off that kind of mania and actually revel in it. With the music industry in disarray, DJ Drama has made his brand larger through beefs with artists, heat from the feds and spearheading some of the best artist- driven mixtapes of the common era with his Gangsta Grillz series. That all brings us to his full length album, Third Power, a collection of run of the mill, mainly radio, club rap that ironically is devoid of any artistic drama.

The paint by numbers music begins with Fabolus chick pandering song x, featuring Roscoe Dash, and Wiz Khalifa, “Oh My.” Girl your ass is fat, you got it going on, hoes be hating, etc. Over synths and slow roasting digital ambient sound. Beef with Jeezy been squashed and “Rough” is proof. Snare drums, 808’s and fight bells play while Jeezy talks drop tops, bricks in his pocket and more boring drug shit with no panache. Poor Freddie Gibbs does all he can to spazz out and make the song something worth it, but he’s like a passenger in a speeding car trying to call 911: there’s nothing he can do.

Philly is in full effect on “Lay Low,” featuring Young Chris, Meek Mill and Freeway. Its probably the lyrical highlight of the album but the production is so blah that it almost doesn’t matter. The boys are snatching the hottest chicks via lots of booze and flossing. The laziest hook ever done ornaments “Ain’t No Way Around It.” Rapper Future delivers an auto-tuned rap about his boy banging his girl with lame ass ad libs. Of course he blames her. *Sigh.

J.Cole and Chris Brown drop creep song undercover. It’s not bad aside from a few corny punch lines but we’ve heard it all before. Pusha T kicks that street shit with French Montana thankfully remaining on the hook for “Everything That Glitters.” The strings add a different element on the periphery of the song and the subtle piano work is great, but that’s almost ruined by the snare drum beneath.

Gucci Mane delivers a coherent if conceptually uninspired song on”Me & My Money.” “Peter Piper” is pillaged on the Wale rapped, Talia Cole sang “Never See You Again. It’s a good pace changer and the classic beat novelty is there to help save the day. Red Cafe drops nursery level rhymes on “Self Madem” Itaks never dope when an East Coast artist fronts like he’s from Down South. Yo Gotti sounds too close to Jeezy on this one for comfort.

Boring production again derails the Crooked I, B.o.B. collaboration “Take My City.” It’s a typical I rep my hood song not bad enough to be wack not good enough to notice. Crooked tries but it’s not enough. As soon as you hear Akon you think it’s 2006 all over again only now it”s “Locked Down” instead of “Locked Up.” More meh. The perfect close to the album comes with the “Oh My” remix featuring Tre Songz, 2 Chains and sophomoric king Big Sean.

For all the great mixtapes Drama has dropped, Third Power is a big disappointment. You ever wonder how things are overwhelming or underwhelming but nothing is ever whelming? Welcome to Welmingville. ZZZ.

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