Benny the Butcher - Burden of Proof ALBUM REVIEW

-
I know, I know. There’s more Griselda albums. This most likely is the last one of the label’s dominant 2020 run, and they might be saving the best for last. Benny the Butcher’s last album, Tana Talk 3, is beloved by fans, and his EP The Plugs I Met is equally loved. There’s a lot of hype surrounding this project, even if the famous Griselda over-saturation of 2020 has been showing Quantity > Quality. With the entirety of Benny’s new album Burden of Proof being produced by Hit-Boy, this only adds to the anticipation. Why am I still talking? Let’s just get right into the highly-anticipated Burden of Proof.

Burden of Proof is a hip-hop album with jazz influences. If you know Griselda projects, you’re probably gonna go into this expecting lo-fi, loopy, and drum-less beats. The only thing out of those three is loopy. Nearly every single beat here is absolutely addicting to listen to. The beats here are a lot more joyful and triumphant, best shown on the opening track, which is also the title track. While becoming a Griselda fan only this year, I couldn’t help but get chills when Benny said “The butcher comin’” for the first time on this album. I could honestly say that every beat on here is at least enjoyable, none of them being downright bad. The true highlight here, though, is Benny’s writing in performance. He has some of the best storytelling in rap right now, and his dark vibe paired with his near-flawless introspection is a killer combo. Along with that, the features are pretty great too. Rick Ross, Freddie Gibbs, Lil Wayne, and Big Sean all deliver some of their best features in a while. They definitely brought their a-game to this album, especially Lil Wayne, which is honestly his best feature since he dropped Tha Carter V. If there’s a song I wouldn’t go back to, I guess it would be “New Streets.” It’s not inherently BAD, but it’s just so underwhelming compared to the other tracks.

Overall, I’m pretty satisfied with Burden of Proof. It’s essentially Benny doing what he does best, but the backdrop of Hit-Boy’s production elevates this album to a new level. I do think Tana Talk 3 is a little bit better, but I’ll be keeping this in my rotation for a bit.


7/10


Stream Burden of Proof here

Spotify

Apple Music

YouTube Music



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Lil Yachty - Let’s Start Here. ALBUM REVIEW

-
Image
I gotta keep holding to my promises about reviewing. I always love it when an artist takes a risk with their material. Whether or not it works out, I usually admire the risk and appreciate the fact that any artist can do something out of their comfort zone. Either way, the artist in question today is Lil Yachty, a rapper that has basically become a joke the longer his career’s gone on. However, going into a new genre out of left field isn’t totally new to rap. Childish Gambino jumping into the world of neo-soul with Awaken, My Love! , along with later projects from Mac Miller and Tyler, the Creator having more jazz influences, have proven that turning to a new genre for new ideas has worked out pretty well. Yachty, however, has turned to psychedelic rock in the vein of Tame Impala for this new album, Let’s Start Here. to mark the new chapter of his career. Let’s get into it. Having stuck around with Yachty during the rough patches, I can easily say that Let’s Start Here. is his best ...
Read more

Kendrick Lamar - GNX ALBUM REVIEW

-
Image
Woah, a new review? After this long? Yeah, sure. Why not? I got some plans in the works to keep this active in some form, and I’ll show off some more details in the post after this! What timing for an album to end up bringing this little site back, even if it’s just for a little bit of time. The last post on here was last June, and a lot has happened in my life since then, whether it’s in music or my personal life. Arguably, the biggest moment in music of the year was the beef between Drake and Kendrick Lamar, which exploded just before this summer with “Like That,” a song off of the first of two Future and Metro Boomin’ albums from this year, WE DON’T TRUST YOU . I don’t need to go into just how massive this beef was (and in still is in some ways), but if you need one major takeaway, I’ll say this: One of the biggest hits of the year, regardless of genre, essentially boiled down to Kendrick calling Drake a pedophile for four-and-a-half minutes. “Not Like Us,” a song where one of the m...
Read more

Porter Robinson - Nurture ALBUM REVIEW

-
Image
I wanna just lay in a field of grass, but I’m allergic to pollen :( I’ve always had a very strange relationship with electronic music. The bad music I’ve heard in the genre has been some of the worst music I’ve ever heard, and the good stuff is some of the greatest music I’ve ever heard. For some context, we have artists like The Chainsmokers on one end, and Daft Punk on the other. There are some subgenres in here too that work. Electropop is one of them, being an obvious fusion of pop and electronic music. In the little community of the AOTY website, the users there have been hyped as hell for this Porter Robinson album, Nurture . It’s apparently his first in seven years, and I’ve only heard one single from it, titled “Musician.” While it wasn’t the best electropop song I’ve heard, it’s certainly an interesting sound that I think can work pretty well. So, with how anticipated it is in the AOTY community, I figured I should take a listen and see what all the fuss is about. Let’s get in...
Read more