Busta Rhymes - The Big Bang

Reviewed By: Melisa Tang (courtesty of thesituation)

It’s official: hip hop today is in a bad state. With songs like ‘Laffy Taffy’ and movements like Hyphy, the future of the rap world looks bleak. That is, until now.

Three years on since Busta Rhymes signed to Dr Dre’s Aftermath label, the result is ‘The Big Bang’. With two hot tracks already a success, ‘Touch It’ commercially and ‘New York Sh*t’ underground, Bus-A-Bus appears to be onto a winner.

It’s been four years since his last album release, and no one knows this more than the man himself. On ‘The Big Bang’, the BK emcee comes at the rap game hard, bringing with him the skills of Nas, Raekwon, Missy Elliot and Stevie Wonder to mention just a few.

With the album executive produced by Dre and Busta, Bus gets things started with ‘Get You Some’ featuring Q-Tip and Marsha from Floetry, and wastes no time in giving you what you want: hot beats topped with classic Busta lyricism. “N*ggas you want heat? I figured you would/That’s why I waste no time to give it to you n*ggas (this time)/And give you all the jewels in (this rhyme), and then I put it down to you all!” he rhymes on the opening track.

Old school legends Stevie Wonder and Rick James make their appearance on the insightful ‘Been Through The Storm’, and ‘In The Ghetto’ respectfully. Bus lets his guard down on both tracks and on the former spits about his parents’ struggle emigrating from Jamaica to the “alleged Land of the Free”, just trying to make a living. His tale of pain and hardship pulls ever so slightly on the heart strings, and the violin strings in the background only add to this effect.

As always, Busta brings the heat on the club tracks, the hot single ‘Touch It’ and follow-up single ‘I Love My Bitch’ featuring Will.i.am and Kelis. As ‘Touch It’ has done for the last couple of months, the next single looks set to be just as big and attract more people to Busta’s ever-growing fanbase.

Busta recruits the skills of Q-Tip once again on ‘You Can’t Hold The Torch’, and it’s good to see the two back together on a track as good as this. Produced by the late J Dilla, this is definitely one that real hip hop fans can relate to as Tip asks, “What happened to the love for the game?”

The album is full of hot tracks; it’s hard to single out any one more than the other. Yet, ‘Cocaina’, ‘Don’t Get Carried Away’ with Nas and ‘Goldmine’ featuring Raekwon are the best examples of Busta at the top of his game.

However, the Missy collab, ‘How We Do It Over Here’, is a bit of a let down, (the only one on the album), as Missy delivers the X-rated chorus over the sinister Dre beat without dropping a verse of her own – a shame since her flow is what we love her most for.

At first, ‘The Big Bang’ takes a little getting used to – to that, I’d admit. It’s been over 15 years since the dude came into the game, and you can’t expect the 30-something rapper to be packing as much heat as he used to back in the day. Nevertheless, Bus-A-Bus puts it down and reps Aftermath whilst keeping his own distinct style throughout the album. It may take a couple of listens to fully get into it, but make no mistake – ‘The Big Bang’ is a classic and definitely worth a place in your collection.


Rating: 4.5 out of 5

Top three tracks:
8) You Can’t Hold The Torch (ft. Q-Tip and Chauncey Black)
11) Don’t Get Carried Away (ft. Nas)
7) Cocaina (ft. Marsha from Floetry)