God Forgives, I Don’t.
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God forgives, and fans, too.
If you are a Rick Ross fan then you’ll know the format.
First comes the silky-voiced girl who lazily says: “M-m-m-maybach music” and we get into the beat. A baritone grunts and you know Ricky Rozay is on the mic.
The sound is heavy beats and some horns, then the Bawws starts rapping. It sounds like an intro, but it is not a song, because it breaks all the rules of one. Let’s just call it a rant. On the album Teflon Don, the rant was titled I’m Not a Star which gave way to Lil’ Wayne’s interpretation, John.
That was then. On God Forgives, I Don’t you’ll be a bit disappointed by the delivery of Pray For Us which has some women discussing Ross’s music. Then, in the same skit, they cut to some dudes in a car praying for forgiveness for the drive-by shooting they are about to do. You then hear gunshots to the backdrop of screeching tyres. It is all too pretentious if you ask me. Just rap, dude.
Then perhaps the biggest mistake he made was break the law of his fans on the song Maybach Music IV. It is the Miami rapper’s fourth album and the man has been dropping a song called Maybach Music on every album. The anatomy of the songs is almost identical with the only difference being that the artists differ from one song to the next. On this one, Ross only featured Neyo, who is not even a rapper.
But when he gets it right, the Bawws gets it right. Take Sixteen, for example, which features the prolific Andre 3000. It is just a show off song that challenges the 16-bar rule in rap songs. Rozay is elevated to royalty when he raps with Dr Dre and Jay-Z on 3 Kings. As usual Jay-Z kills them all, while Dre is busy selling his headphones on his verses.
Omarion is back, signed to Ross’s label, and features on Ice Cold, a so-so song, but nothing like Ice Box, if you’re wondering.
This is not Ross’s best work, but for true fans, it will have to suffice. – Munyaradzi Vomo