(SHUFFLE)

Inconsitency and a lack of originality are the major downfalls of this album. Death Row has gone through quite a tumult in the last few years with the death of Tupac, the departure of most of their major artists and the incarceration of the CEO, Suge Knight.

Unfortunately, instead of looking for up and coming new artists to replace Dre, Snoop and Tupac, Death Row has enlisted some two bit copies to try to retain their audiences. Listen to The Realest and tell me you don't hear Tupac or listen to Top Dogg and tell me he's not trying to be Snoop part two. However, the copies fall short of the originals, not only because of their shameless style jacking, but for their lack of talent.

The other artists also seem below par. Mac-Shawn is terminally unimpressive lyrically, and enlisting E-40 certainly doesn't help that situation. The most impressive new artist seems to be VK (Vanessa Knight, that wouldn't happen to be Suge's sister, would it? Nah. Nepotism never happens.) Even she seems like she's trying to sound like the Lady of Rage from time to time. As for whichever A&R signed Swoop G, Lil' C-Style and Soopafly, they should lose their job instantly. All three of these artists are plagued with flows that are beyond simplistic, to the point of being ridiculous. Michel'le still can't sing, and Doobie is better off not being talked about. Miilkbone returns to the mic, trying to dis Eminem. He's going to get ripped out the frame if these are the best battle rhymes he can come with.

The beats on the album are likewise unimaginative sounding. There are exceptions, but for the most part, the album presents simple two or four bar loops with no progression or development. Bright points in a clouded album include: "Chronic 2000," "Beautiful Lady,"

Dark clouds that should never have seen wax are all over the album, like "Because of You Girl," "Gotta Love Gangsta's," "Top Dogg Cindafella," "Easy to Be A Soldier When There Ain't No War," the absolutely horrible "Drinks On Me," the blatant "Buck 'Em Down" beat jack on "Late Night,"

Honestly, this album would have been much better as a single album, without all the obvious filler material. It'll probably go multi-platinum just from all the lemmings running to buy an album that is not only from Death Row, but has a marijuana leaf on the cover.

The final verdict: While not as bad as I expected, this album is not much better either. There is a lot of music out there better than this, so unless you have bottomless pockets, you should pass on this one and pick up something stronger.

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