Vital Status: Unknown
Analogy: You’ve been listening to an old head talk about his past for an hour and you’re not sure if you want to leave
Genre: Hip-Hop/Rap
Length: 50min
Hip-Hop artist 2 Chainz is back to deliver his 6th studio album So Help Me God! 2 Chainz has slowly evolved and become more aware of his current and past circumstances and this has poured over into his music as of recently. This record has features all over from NBA YoungBoy, Lil Wayne, Ty Dolla $ign, Kanye West, Rick Ross, and more.
On this album we still get conventional 2 Chainz talking about trapping, success, and money. He does have some introspective moments about loosing people close to him and how people have used him in the past. He doesn’t diverge from his sound that has gotten him here and that may be disappointing but expected.
2 Chainz is at his best on So Help Me God! when he’s delivering braggadocios bars over banger beats. From the start “Lambo Wrist” is a perfect example of this 2 Chainz tells apple music that he wanted to bring out the “entree” right away and I think he accomplished that with this track.
The second track on this album follows suite as another banger and strung out flute sound on the intrumental. Chainz continues to flex about how he’s a vet but still at his best in the game. He uses the hook of
Old enough to be your Daddy, young enough to fuck your Mama
to get this point across.
“Save Me” feels like a dud with NBA YoungBoy featured. The singing on the chorus from YoungBoy is not entertaining and rather atrocious. The beat on this still rocks though. Then we get “Money Maker” with a Lil Wayne feature. I was initially excited to here 2 Chainz and Lil Wayne back on a track together but not sure if this is how i wanted it. The college band playing in the background sounds flat on the beat and I think it’s a song about strippers so not sure why 2 Chainz shouts out HBCUs at the end. To me that was confusing.
The moment we all wanted was for Hall & Oates and 2 Chainz on a song together! We finally got it! But in all seriousness as one of the least likely things that I expected on this album was on the track, “Can’t Go For That”, and this turns out very enjoyable. 2 Chainz uses Hall & Oates hit “I Can’t Go for That” as the hook and it just works out.
One of the more peculiar moments is the song “Feel A Way” featuring Brent Faiyaz and Kanye West. Loved the beat and loved Brent Faiyaz’s singing. Some of the lyrics are in question here especially from Kanye which is nothing new. But 2 Chainz gives us the first batch of cringy lyrics such as
And you know this is a hit, Barry Bonds
And my shawty gonna ride me like a Peloton (Ride)
and
I stay fly, yes I’m fly, land on Mike Pence
I do some stupid shit, don’t let ’em dawg me like Mike Vick
Kanye follows suite with some slave bars which he should just avoid at this point. There is some back and forth between 2 Chainz and Kanye which leads to a bar about Roc-A-Fella which is slick.
After this point there aren’t to many more highlights or lowlights. Everything toes the line of mediocre and conventional. We get a quarantine song featuring Mullatto that is another banger. This song sounds like something NLE Choppa should be on.
One of the more forgetful tracks on this record is “Free Lighter” where the chorus is annoying and the Chief Keef and Lil Uzi Vert features don’t add anything to this song. “Toni” is a track where Chainz raps in 3rd person over some nice production about his drug dealing ways. About halfway through we get a cool beat switch and 2 Chainz feels right in his element. Following this 2 Chainz takes a more introspective approach on “Southside Hov” and “Vampire”. Nothing wrong with these two tracks but would not say this is 2 Chainz strong point.
Same goes for the remaining tracks on So Help Me God! “YRB” has some cool production elements and a clever interlude from Big Rube that plays nicely on the drug dealing themes discussed in this album. But, Rick Ross has a “hoes getting peed on” bar which is a turn off. “Wait For You To Die” is an interesting and sad idea, but, 2 Chainz never takes advantage of this and uses +1min of the track to talk instead of convey his thoughts in a rap about the topic at hand. “55 Times” is a mediocre way to end not leaving us with much to take home from this album as a whole.
Again, 2 Chainz is at his best when he’s flexing over a banger beat. Those moments happen on So Help Me God! but not consistently enough to raise the bar. When Chainz is out of his element it really shows and lives at average.
Albums Are Dead💀 