Young Jeezy's TM103: Hustlerz Ambition Review
Let me start by saying that I have not been a huge Young Jeezy fan, for one main reason: all of his songs sound the same. I mean, granted, many rappers rap about the same things over and over again( Lil Wayne, Ace Hood, etc.), but he seemed to rap about the same topics on the SAME exact beats. Repping his hood, calling out haters,bragging & talking about him moving drugs over the banging, Lex Luger type beats with the crazy bass. Trap music.
And that’s fine, I love that stuff in moderation, but it gets redundant after a while. That’s what Jeezy had become to me: redundant. And The Real Is Back and The Real Is Back 2 did nothing to disprove that claim to me. They featured the same beats, same topics, everything. So, because of this blatant repetition, I wasn’t even going to listen to his album, TM 103: Hustlerz Ambition. That is, until I heard F.A.M.E..
This song- which leaked a month or two ago- surprisingly, had a different sound to it. The beat wasn’t a full-on banger, but it was still some nasty production, and the verses were solid; not to mention the fact that he got Tip to get on that track and rip it with him.
So, this song got my attention, and actually got me kind of excited for this album.
Which is why, when I heard the first 6 songs of the album, I was rather disappointed. Jeezy was back to the same stuff. He was rapping about his deals in the drug game, his hood, and saying SNOW incessantly in the background of the same heavy-hitting, bass filled beats. I’m not saying these beats are a bad thing, but when an artist never deviates from those beats, as I’ve said before, it gets boring.
I was just about to turn the album off, but the next song salvaged it. “All We Do” featured the first soul-ish sample of the album, and didn’t talk solely about what he had been talking about; he actually talked about his relationship with a girl for a while. And I liked it.
And the next song was also different for him, and pretty deep: “Leave Me Alone” tells the story of one of Jeezy’s girls knowing that he isn’t good for her, but she still doesnt want to leave him. It tells of this relationship over a catchy piano beat with Ne-Yo lending his vocals to the hook.
Following this piece is another solid song. Jeezy found himself an inspirational beat and tells of his rise from nothing to the big time in “Everythang”. The content of the song seems to fit the beat perfectly, and with this song, he continued to surprise me with variety. And it only got better from there.
The next three songs are my favorite off of the album: “Trapped”, featuring Jill Scott, the aforementioned “F.A.M.E.”, and “I Do” with legends Hov and Tree Stacks on it.
If you were to just look at the title of it, you’d think that “Trapped” is trap music. Right? Wrong. It’s not. Jill Scott comes in with what you expect to be a hard verse at first, but turns into the hook, which is pretty catchy. Then The Snow Man comes in with the real verses, about the trials and tribulations of growing up in the hood over a beat that nearly gave me chills, word to J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League. Then “F.A.M.E.” fits into the album very well here, serving as a perfect centerpiece for the album.
Although, I think it would be more fitting to call it a “joint centerpiece”, because “I Do” following it is just as much of a masterpiece. This continues Jay-Z’s hot streak in 2011, and marks the third time Andre 3000 has annihilated a beat on another guy’s album(see here and here). The three all give verses about finding “the girl of their dreams”, with each person’s bars symbolizing something different(see our lyrical breakdown of the song for more).
Now the next song of the album was, to me, one of the biggest musical surprises of 2011: Jizzle making a completely chill song. Like, a Wiz Khalifa song. Minus the Wiz Khalifa. He gets three people well-versed in songs like this, Snoop Dogg, Devin The Dude, and Mitchellel to make “Higher Learning” with him. This smooth beat and the crew on it gives off a real chill vibe, and gives the album even more diversity, which is the one major thing I didn’t expect from it.
The next two songs got back to the values that Jeezy built himself up off of and implemented into the first six songs of the album: trap music. However, as I said, I like this in moderation, and the differences in the last seven songs helped me to tolerate- even like- this section of the album. The fact that Jeezy got Trick Daddy to deliver a whack verse on “This Ones For You” made Jeezy seem better, but probably lessened the overall value of the album. The next song, as far as the feature goes, is nearly opposite: Freddie Gibbs outshined Jeezy a little on “.38”, and raised the overall value of the album to me.
The album wraps up with two of my Young Jeezy favorites which I already had on my iPod- “Ballin'” ft. Lil Wayne and “Lose My Mind” ft. Plies– and the outro, “Never Be the Seem”. This song is a melancholy memoir of the hood and all the wrong that comes out of it. Even though I come from no where near the hood, something about the beat and what Jeezy said actually touched me. I feel like it was a great way to end the album.
So, my final impression of the album is vasty different from what I thought it would be when I first turned it on. As I have expressed throughout this review, I was pleasantly surprised at the diversity through the middle of the album, and happy with the way it ended. Although it started a little slow, it ended on a very high note with a very strong back end, and some great features. I give it a 4 out of 5 overall. So, let me end by saying that I am now a pretty big Young Jeezy fan.
Agree? Disagree? Leave your reaction below.
