Hood Star Explicit Lyrics

After many years it's nice to see that wew can get an official album with some of Crooked i"s songs (most i'm sure were probably going to be on his "Say Hi to the Bad Guy" album). For fans of his, I'm sure you've heard some of these tracks over the past 8 years or so. They have 15 songs on here. Of the 15, 2 ar enear classics, 3 ar eok, the other 10 are good, with a couple being real good. Guests are on 8 of the songs (and are mostly second generation Death Row artists), rapping on 7 and just doing the hook on 1. Production is pretty good. Darren Vegas does 11 and Big Hutch does 4 (as always he does an excellent job). Crooked I has put out many mixtapes over the years and has been around on the west coast scence since 1997 (that's when I first heard of him anyway), and has constatly been, in my opinion, a top mc that was way underrated and under exposed. I have his 2007 "Life after Death Row" mixtape, which I'd say is 4 stars and he was part of the super group, Slaughterhouse (with Royce da 5'9, Joell Ortiz & Joe Budden) which dropped an album last summer. A nice album to have for his fans.

#1 - 9 (nice beat)
#2 - 8.5
#3 - 8.5 (f/ eastwood, spider loc, ray j)
#4 - 9 (nice beat)
#5 - 8
#6 - 8.5
#7 - 7.5
#8 - 8.5 (f/ spider loc, virginya slim, danny boy -- good beat)
#9 - 7.5 (f/ eastwood & kurupt)
#10 - 9.5 (f/ eastwood & ray j)
#11 - 8.5 (f/ juvenile & sisqu -- nice upbeat track)
#12 - 8.5 (f/ too $hort, eastwood, virginya slim)
#13 - 7.5
#14 - 8 (f/ tamara savage)
#15 - 9.5 (f/ eastwood, ganxsta ridd, danny boy & K-Ci -- deeper song with tight beat)

Dominick Wickliffe -- Long Beach, CA
Check all my reviews

Great M.C., I don't know what happened on this project, only a couple of decent songs. Too bad! missed opportunity.

Although, I am a huge Crooked I/ Circle of Bosses fan.
This material is outdated and actually Deathrow Records Material.
The material inside is at best mediocre with production. My suggestion,
Do not buy this album, wait for the Real Crooked I release and spend your money there.
Do not be fooled by this CD, the record label is Deathrow/AKA Suge Knight.

It's no big secret that after the death of 2pac, Suge Knight going to jail, and the rest of the headline artist left the label...the golden era of Death Row Records was over. Various attempts at a comeback were made with one artist being the new star artist of the label who people have heard on various songs before before (Snoop Dogg's "Feel So Good" off the Ride SDTK & "Step Up" from Kurupt's "Streetz Is A Mutha") by either featuring him on their albums of former artist (2pac's "Nu-Mixx Klassiks" & Tha Dogg Pound's "2002"), having guest appearences on songs from associates such as Murder Inc. (Ja Rule's "Last Temptation", Irv Gotti Presents Tha Inc., and Ashanti's remix of "Baby"), and being the top showcased artist on their own complimation albums (Too Gangsta For Radio) & soundtracks (DysFUNKtional Family) while releasing a mixtape as well (Westcoasanostra) & even making an appearence with Suge himself on Jimmy Kimmel's talk show. However as usual on Death Row, his albums ("Untouchable" & "Say Hi To The Bad Guy") never saw the light of day & he left the label. While he's gone on to gain more underground popularity by releasing a DVD along with various & mixtapes & EP's, making guest appearences, a weekly freestyle series, and even a group album under the name Slaughterhouse with Royce Da 5'9 & others...WideAwake Ent. are the new owners of Death Row & are finally "officially" releasing the material (to much controversy) from Crooked I.

This album contains 15 songs from Crooked I's time on Death Row Records with production from their top in-house producers in Big Hutch & Darren Vegas. There were various guest appearences on the album from then-Death Row artist such as Kurupt (West Coast), Eastwood (Lil Youngsters, West Coast, House Party, B*tch, Me & Dogg), Virginia Slim (Go Hard), Spider (Lil Youngsters & Go Hard) along with other guest appearences from Ray J (House Party, Lil Youngsters, B*tch), Juvenile & Sisqo from Dru Hill (So Damn Hood Remix), Too Short (B*tch) and K-Ci from Jodeci (Me & My Dogg). While my favorite tracks on here were "So Crooked", "West Coast", "House Party", and "Cali Love III"...I was really disappointed in with the collaboration tracks "B*tch" & "Me & My Dogg" while songs like "F' Em", "Haters", and "Live At The Row" came off more like freestyle sessions.

The only song on here that was released by the label itself in the past was "So Damn Good" since Death Row actually did release that song to radio as a single eventhough it didn't get many spins & the remix on here with Juvenile adding a verse getting even less attention. As I stated earlier, this album is very controversal in the fact that Crooked I himself doesn't support this project to the point where he told the fans to bootleg it while the producers of Darren Vegas & Cold 187um/Big Hutch support the project. It should be noted that eventhough this is the first "official" release of Crooked I's material from Death Row, these songs have been featured on various bootlegs of his "Say Hi To The Bad Guy" album throughout the internet.

In the end, I have to be honest in that this album was just average at best as it had it's even mix of songs with replay value & songs that I just didn't care for while or disappointed with the rest were just average to good but none of them really stood out to me & aren't something I would have in heavy rotation. So if your a big Crooked I fan then I would recommend but otherwise this is one release that I would skip or at listen to online then make your own judgement.

Side Note: There is a bonus track on the iTunes download called "Ghetto Love."

This album contains songs that were vaulted by death row records and finally they decided to release them. Suge Knight no longer owns death row and the new management is finally releasing albums and paying royalties to the artists. Definitely worth a buy. I would say the songs are out of date but still dope.

So this is material recorded on Crooked I's time at Death Row records and I guess the new owners put it together and released it. While it is outdated material and Crooked I's skills have developed to be much better this is still a great collection of his music and I bump it.