2 out of 5

Label: Obese

Producer: Hilltop Hoods

Dang guys.  I’m glad I heard an album from the start of their career AND an album toward the latter half of their career, ’cause this breakout album is so generic in comparison that, had I heard it first, I might not have continued my explorations of their catalogue.  AND WHERE WOULD THEY BE NOW IF THAT HAPPENED, EH?

There’s the playfulness of their earlier work that would evolve into a very comfortable sound on their later work – and on those two sides, the group remained slick and confident, dropping some typical fun n’ games tracks (instead of smoking, the Hoods like to sing about drinking) but populating these with enough clever lyrics and some interesting ideas to flesh them out beyond filler, making the tracks with more thoughtful lyrical content stand up that much taller.  DJ Debris compositions followed the same path of finding their way to an established sound, with his element of consistency being the smooth blend of samples and sounds into warm beats that were capable of getting you moving and also worth sitting back and listening to at the same time.  The band seemed to fiddle right at the cusp of a “popular” sound – very accessible – but the continual originality kept it from feeling like just another group.

And then there’s ‘The Hard Road,’ a mid-point.  Apparently this came after getting acclaim for ‘The Calling,’ so perhaps we’re struggling with trying to stay true while giving the fans what they want… and that rarely works out well.  Somehow everything shifts here from just sounding like posturing instead of just representing, just a tad too boastful, I suppose, and there seems to be an extra abundance of those “fun” tracks I mentioned.  So instead of a song about drinking and puking being a good balance for a weightier track, you get more and more evidence of The Hoods as party boys, which tips the scales into making their “story” tracks feel trite and trying.  There are still some good moments here, but it feels very diluted, even though there’s the trademark flow of rarely repeated lines or rhymes.  But still – it’s different.  The stop-start rhyming style disappears, and both our M.C.’s sound the same… with a rolling Eminemish delivery that starts to blend together during the runtime.  And alas, the beats don’t help.  Again, some moments shine, and there’s something thematic going on with stripping out the low end and mixing in some 70s soul elements, but this ain’t an instrumental group, but Debris leaves plenty of room for his crew to polish these beats up into something thrilling, and it just doesn’t come together.

So the whole album sounds like the crowd-pleaser that it is.  I haven’t listened to ‘Calling’ yet, but I do know that the group returned to a more grounded, earthy sound for the excellent “State of the Art,” so I guess they got whatever kicks they needed to out of their system.