The Purple Tape Review

Release Date: 1-12-10

*Download link is available in previous post*

Rapper Big Pooh has returned with a new release to follow up last year's The Delightful Bars. However, it's not the anticipated Dirty Pretty Things project. Instead, the Big Pooh has decided to put out material recorded over a beat tape by Black Milk known for it's Prince samples (hence the name The Purple Tape).

The mixtape begins with "When Im Done" where Pooh basically shouts out all his peers that are killing it before flowing. He starts off pretty nice, speaking about the stereotypes rappers tend to face and the recession. This definitely sounds like it could've been a Little Brother record. Despite this, the track ends abruptly leading into arguably one of the stand out tracks "Blueprint." Pooh's flow is sharp and he sounds very comfortable in delivery, which helps bring out the vibe provided by the beat. And if that's not enough, the chorus is easily memorable and shows that Pooh plans to remain loyal to the Justice League and makes a bold claim to partly being responsible to some artists' styles.

"You can say what you wanna say about my crew
Most new niggaz out been influenced by who?
Justus, we the blueprint, watch how we do sheeit
We inspired all yall through are music"

Not too long after comes a nice Justus collab with Joe Scudda on "Put It In The Air". The two show they tap well together without their other Reservoir Dogs, but it's hard to decide who came harder. Both came with a nice flow and Joe had a few clever punchlines, comparing him and Pooh to Al Pacino and Robert Deniro.

The latter of The Purple Tape talks more about ladies. Songs like "Girlfriend" finds Pooh questioning a relationship with a girl that's supposed to be his main. "Camera Tricks" is your usual raunchy, club type track telling all the nasty girls to pose for the camera. Thankfully, the project doesn't end on that subject note, as Pooh goes back to talking about his reality musically on "Say Something" (and it doesn't sound anything like Drake's song with the same title).

Overall, The Purple Tape is filled with some nice moments, but nothing stands out as extraordinary or spectacular. It's obvious Pooh is still trying to make it out of the shadow of Phonte, the other half of Little Brother, but still is somewhat struggling. His lyricism is good and the delivery is strong, but something is still missing that keeps him from being more well rounded like Phonte. It also doesn't help that The Purple Tape has 11 tracks (which in actuality is 10 because the last one isn't really a song) and has about 5 features. Hopefully he shows more growth on Dirty Pretty Things and accomplishes stepping out of Phonte's shadow more.

*All tracks of the mixtape can be heard and downloaded on Rapper Big Pooh's bandcamp page*