Welcome to Week 2 of our Book (Album) Club! This weeks album is LIVE.LOVE.A$AP by A$AP Rocky. Please give the album a fresh listen and give us your thoughts, opinions and possibly hot takes.
Doesn’t matter if this is your 100th time listening to the album or you listen to the album the first time right before posting!
Upcoming Calendar
October 3rd: Poverty’s Paradise by Naughty By Nature
October 10th: Invasion of Privacy by Cardi B
October 17th: R.A.P. Music by Killer Mike
October 24th: AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted by Ice Cube
Check out the Weekly Album Club thread over at !alternativenation@lemmy.world if you have some free time and want to check out something different. No proper affiliation, I just think it is neat that they are doing this too!
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Technically a mixtape I believe and released for free in 2011, this is the only album of the initial first 4 weeks I planned that I had never listened to prior to selecting it. I knew this was what blew up Rocky, and really the whole A$AP Mob but my first Rocky album wasn’t until 2013 with LONG.LIVE.A$AP.
Overall
I was not disappointed, this very much feels like a prototype of LONG.LIVE.A$AP. Rocky is the only rapper besides Snoop Dogg that just oozes cool to me and it is all over this album. Thinking back to 2011, I can’t imagine any other rapper of the time calling himself a “pretty motherfucker” and somehow coming out the other side with everybody agreeing. This was before Young Thug and before Lil Uzi Vert, at the time Hip Hop was just dropping of the hyper masculine facade and Rocky went a step ahead of other innovators by not just wearing what he wanted and looking how he wanted, but by being undeniably cool as fuck while doing it. Kanye had did it before but Kanye has never been what I’d define as “cool” and tight pants had started to make an appearance in raper wardrobes, but nobody was doing it like Rocky.
On to the album, shit is an experience before anything else. I love the production, with the generally slow beats and the grimy sounding vocal effects used where a lot of rappers would use a more traditional ad-lib. While rocky is rapping about drugs and getting high on Purple Swag, I can feel the calmness and relaxed vibe I get when I get the right type of high. This album isn’t about the word play or the punchlines, it is about the vibe.
Best Tracks No particular order
Trilla hits different from the rest of the album for me. Maybe it is just the energy of having Nast and Twelvyy on the track but this is the best straight up rapping Rocky does on this album imo. Twelvvy’s verse is the standout to me, with his voice and flow being perfect on this track.
Purple Swag makes me think back to my younger days. I’m older with 3 kids and I get high maybe twice a year when the kids are at their grandmother’s house. That said, the vibes on this song reminds me of my early 20’s going out, having some drinks, eating an edible and just vibing with friends.
Houston Old Head is all about the hook for me. The whole song is good but I can’t NOT song along to this hook. Almost a shame because I don’t like when my kids use language talking about hoes and I try to set a good example, but here we are. I blame DJ Burn One and Rocky.
Also good but I have less to say is Roll One Up and Bass
Worst Track There is just one
Leaf just doesn’'t work for me. It is basically all down to Main Attrakionz. Their name is dumb and while they rap like Rocky, they don’t have any of the swagger that makes it work. Also, “it feels good waking up to money in the bank” is a lame ass lyric. I know Rocky uses that exact lyric on Goldie and maybe elsewhere, but he sounds cool enough to get away with it. On a semi related note, I actually checked the next album they put out after this song dropped, Bossalinis & Fooliyones and it wasn’t very good. It was fine. It also came out in October, the year following this song dropping. They did have some mixtapes come out in 2011 and maybe one of them was November, but they said album.
I’m probably more of a casual hip hop head compared to others here, but THIS mixtape is something special to me. I listened religiously when it came out and bumped it in my first car for several summers. This is my 2nd place for all-time most scrobbled releases on last.fm
I really think what sets this apart for me is the beats. Peso, and Palace and Bass with Clams Casino… They’re all very memorable and have a certain something that I don’t find often in hip hop. The pitched down vocals are also something I hadn’t heard often making this feel extra fresh and rebellious.
Best tracks: Palace, Bass, Peso, Purple Swag PART 2 (missing from most versions - because SGP beef? - link below), Trilla. You really can’t go wrong with this one.
If you liked that pitched down vocal style, you should check out some of DJ Screw’s old stuff. His remix’s are basically what popularized that sound.
You also might like some Three 6 Mafia, as they were influenced by that style.
I have heard a little bit of DJ Screw.
Three 6’s Mystic Stylez has been a favourite for a long time, but I didn’t care for much else I had heard from them. Open to listening some more though. Do you have any album recommendations for either?
I’m on mobile so I can’t do links at the moment, but if you liked Mystic Stylez you might like “Chapter One: The End”, that is probably the closest album they did to that. Maybe “Underground Volume One”, specifically tracks like “Now I’m High, Really High” and “Ridin in the Chevy” from the start of the album lean in to that slowed down sound.
Not as sure about DJ screw. Ive heard his mixes over the years but I can’t say I’ve ever dated down and listened to a whole album.
I’ll start with those. Thank you!
This is my first time experiencing this album and maybe the first time hearing ASAP Rocky. So my first impression is that it’s great production with okay rapping.
I see the appeal of ASAP Rocky’s bravado and confidence but it doesn’t really do anything for me. It’s good in small doses but not as a whole album.
I love the production. Question for the hiphopheads. Is this considered Chopped and Screwed? with the slowed down beats and slowed down vocal parts? It just makes for a really cool vibe.
I especially love the Clams Casino beats. A couple of my favorite tracks were Bass and Sandman which honestly sound similar on the back end but I knew I liked Clams Casino before going into this so I wasnt surprised to like a few of those tracks.
I also like Trilla. I think maybe because it wasn’t all Rocky and has a couple other ASAPs rapping on it. It was a nice change of pace from a rapping standpoint.
it’s great production with okay rapping.
This for sure describes Rocky very well and I assume that is intentional. Or at least that he is aware of it. The A$AP collective was formed as a group of rappers, producers and fashion designers. Most notably A$AP Barry and A$AP K never did anything on the musical side as far as I can tell (though Barry is no longer affiliated with the Mob as he is a sexual predator piece of shit). I think Rocky goes more for the vibe and energy, knowing he isn’t going to go down in history as a legendary MC.
Is this considered Chopped and Screwed?
I’d personally consider it Chopped & Screwed influenced. Specifically the slowed down vocals and such you are talking about are for sure influenced by the Houston sound, and songs like Bass lean pretty heavily in to it. But songs like Palace and Trilla are for sure too fast to be considered Chopped and Screwed on their own. There actually is a Chopped and Screwed Remix of the album that was posted on the A$AP Mob website back in the day that might give you an idea of what it might sound like if it leaned fully in to that.
Glad you enjoyed the album on the whole, even if Rocky’s actual rapping wasn’t 100% doing it for you!
