It’s becoming clear that the Top Dawg Entertainment may be the San Antonio Spurs of Hip Hop. Both are terrifyingly tactical entities that don’t move without careful consideration and laser precision. The Spurs have won five NBA championships and TDE has just as many classic albums thanks to their quality over quantity model; especially when it comes to star player ScHoolboy Q.
The proud Hoover Street Crip waited nearly three years to drop a follow up to Blank Face LP which would seem to be a non-issue given Q’s impressive consistency across only a small handful of projects. In fact, for the past seven years, the “Q” could have stood for quality; but that module has taken a detour this time around.
CrasH Talk, Q’s fifth official album, doesn’t quite hit the creative, catchy or Crip-tastic pinnacles his previous projects effortlessly hurdled. Naturally, the hype and lofty expectations surrounding this album need to be taken into consideration but even still, Q’s zany aggression and heartfelt ghetto gospels are shells of themselves.
The 14-track album opens with “Gang Gang” which, for all intents and purposes, bangs pretty damn hard. DJ Flu and J-Bo deliver a heavy-duty beat on which Q pleasantly raps a “whole lotta fucking gang shit” but from there the tracklist quickly unwinds. “Tales” nonchalantly details the trials of his past and present hood endeavors (a story we’ve heard from Quincy many times before). Then there’s the second single “CHopstix” with Travis Scott which looks good on paper (especially with Jake One and DJ Dahi on the beat) but turns out to be a half-baked, cookie-cutter radio hopeful with a bland chorus.
It’s the short and sweetly sinister “Numb Numb Juice” that keeps the album from flat-lining before it even really begins.
If “Numb Numb Juice” is the eagerly taken shots of Henny then “Drunk” is the inebriated ex-boyfriend/girlfriend call at 3 a.m. Featuring silky smooth 6LACK, the track is the first instance on the album where ScHoolboy’s performance feels and sounds truly genuine. He cascades his gentlemanly gangster lines over soft keys and intoxicating vocal layering. He takes the hazy vibration even further on the Kid Cudi-assisted “Dangerous” that eerily slides down a sinkhole of existential questioning like “Can’t get high enough to get over the hump/How many friends around me helping me lose?/How many excuses until I’m excused?”
“CrasH” is where Q really gets some of those acclaimed bars off with lines that shed light on his current state of mind: “Nigga gotta hit the golf course to get a peace of mind/Family friends want a piece of mine” and also empower his daughter: “So, girl, be proud that your skin black/And be happy, girl, that your hair napped”. But aside from this track and the few aforementioned deeper cuts, Q sounds surprisingly uninspired throughout the duration of the album.
Even the swaggy “Water,” where the Cardo and Johnny Juliano slap begs to be absolutely dunked on, gets the boring Tim Duncan layup from Q.
It’s not that ScHoolboy needs a hit to survive but CrasH Talk provides less insight to his life than Habits & Contradictions, less creative experimentation than Blank Face LP and even fewer distinct hits than Oxymoron. There are without doubt a few tracks on this album that could make it to your favorite ScHoolboy playlist but said “few” don’t outweigh the remaining dozen that fall flat on their blank face. If Q can get back to drawing board and channel some revitalized inspiration for his next project then CrasH Talk can simply be a forgivable drop in the great big bucket hat that is Q’s catalog.
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2/5
Another three years of silence will bury his career.
To be honest this year is very bad for hip hop so far. Most of the releases are pretty average
gotta have more than just 1 style guys… no1 wants to hear the same from Q, c’mon. He’s never been weak.
Q got style, not supposed to sound the same on every album.
I think it’s great project that will grow on people. I’ve kept it in constant rotation since it’s dropped and I’m really enjoying it. Only songs I don’t like are Chopstix and Lies. Overall, it’s solid.
My thoughts exactly!!
AVERAGE RUN OF THE MILL ALBUM. THE ENERGY IS OFF ON THIS ONE. 2.5/5
SCORE
This article was too generous with that rating, his worst album by far
Album was good, though the features were dissapointing
Trash album. From production to features and overall sound it was weak. I couldn’t even stand listening to it once without skipping anything.
forgot to rate
Not gon’ lie, Schoolboy underwhelmed me this time around but maybe I’ve just come to expect too much from TDE. Even the features who are normally pretty consistent in their own respective worlds seemed to be underdelivering on this record for whatever reason. Production’s good, artwork’s good, length is doable, it’s just this time it seems like it’s more flash without the fire.
I want but no I can’t enjoy this
Definitely a let down. Only one good song on the album. Not sure who is in his ear, but the music keeps getting worse.
Fire
Heat
I met schoolboy personally in Dallas. And I told him “thank you for your music and art he’d givin to the world”. He said “thanks homie” then I said for-real thank you Cuz before him or the rest of the TDE roster I was lost. No one wants to sit down and feel the entirety of an album so a super badass piece of work like “CrashtalK” fall on stupid ass ,closeminded ,internet dweebs ears☆
That’s what I call DICKRIDIN at its finest ??
Dick ridin huh? Let me guess you prolly think old town road is tight though right…yup! Knew dat was u☆
Very bad
chop chop chop chop chop chop
TrasH Talk
trash album. its obv hes just in cash grab mode and knows his fan boys will eat it up. he doesnt wanna rap anymore and it shows
this review is the only thing thats bad. crash talk is bumping. always giving the west coast artist a bad review. listen for yourself you’ll see that the lyrics and beats are on point. Q is one of the greats.
Album has less than a few good songs on it.
Damn shame. He was one of my favorites out of TDE but KDot & Jay Rock has taken that spot. Hopefully he can do better next album
Not bad
3/5
So tired of 808’s with some crap synth lines. Make real music again with some dope samples or play some instruments. 808s with crappy synth arpeggios is getting played out fast. I can’t even listen to it anymore,
Yeah I’ll pass
But Quavo can slide in here with some humming and mumbles and catch a 4.5 or some shit. These reviews are trash.
Quavo album was bad too but still better than CrasH Talk
You must be crazy Qauvo album was terrible no where near as good as crash talk
Get off schoolboy’s dicc this is terrible
Quavo is trash as well. This album just blows…and I’m a big tde fan……
quavo got a 3.3 so nah
Not my favorite Schoolboy album but its not that bad. I do agree with some of the commenters though. This wave that him, Cole and Kendrick been on lately doing this trap sound is really getting old man. Go back to the samples and slow flow.
You do realize we love this album
Terrible as usual! Any dude on the street can rap better than this. Wack records hurt my ears. Stop embarrassing yourself and just quit, take the lil boys with you.
Decent album, not Blank Face tho
Use to be a huge School Boy fan but this album sounded lazy only 3 tracks stuck out to me Dangerous (which was too short and needed more Cudi) Crash, and Attention which is the sound I love for Q he needs to jus make an album with only Alchemist