Thug Life Army

In 1971 when Jim Morrison of the rock group The Doors died, so did The Doors. There where attempts to regain some status but with out Jim Morrison the band was just not strong enough on their own to make a go of it.

The Supremes fell apart after Diana Ross left, as well as almost every Motown group when one of the founders or the ‘headliner’ left the group.

The list could go on; the band Big Brother and the holding Company dissolved after Janis Joplin’s death in 1970. Jimi Hendrix’s the Experience and the Band of Gypsies never bounced back after the death of Hendrix in 1970; so there is a history of failure among music groups after the leader of a group either quits or passes on.

This seems to be true in Hip-Hop and Rap to. The latest Outlawz album proves that once the ‘leader’ of a group is no longer with the group the group slowly withers away. Some groups understand this and find other avenues for their talents.

Some of the Outlawz have moved on and there are now only 3 remaining members of the original group together.

A press release prior to the album dropping had said “One thing you won’t hear on the new Outlawz album is Tupac. Plenty of other material with Tupac and the Outlawz, including the platinum plus ‘Still I Rise’ album, exists. Therefore, the group wanted ‘Outlaw 4 Life’ to be their moment in the spotlight. “It’s time for us to stand up on our own,” Noble says. “Pac did enough for us. He gave us the blueprint. We’re talented and we don’t need to have Pac on the album. People want to hear some new Outlawz stuff and they want to hear us on their own.”

Well yes we don’t hear the voice of the late great rap icon Tupac Shakur but many of the songs make reference to him; making sure the listener remembers that Tupac was connected with the group. Another thing we hear is ‘Outlawz’ yelled through out giving the album that mix tape feel and of course there is a shout out to a web site that adds to the mix-tape feel to this drop.

As for the ‘blueprint’ this album contains 17 tracks and took over 3 years to come out. Tupac laid down 21 tracks in 7 days for the ‘Makaveli – 7 Day Theory’ album (and 12 were used). The ‘lessons’ that were learned were not implemented apparently.

The album contains some good beats and the direction is meaningful but there is something lacking in the delivery of the lyrics. This could be that in the back of your mind you expect Tupac to bust loose with a powerful flow.

From diverse beats there is a little bit of west, south and mellow tracks.

One of the better tracks is a track called ‘Big Ballin’. This is a southern feel and a great delivery and beat.

The track ‘These Are The Times’ is on the mellow side but it is one of the tracks you can really feel on the album. It actually has meaning and is thought provoking and delivers a message. ‘Ghetto Gospel pt. 2’ and ‘Loosing My Mind’ can fit in this area as well.

At least we can be thankful that they didn’t take any Tupac tracks and ‘twist’ them as bad as Interscope did with ‘Loyal to the Game’.

The production and the beats help make this album supportable. On a 1-10 scale the Outlaw 4 Life: 2005 A.P. receives a score of 6.

The Outlawz need to understand that some of what was said on this album needed to be said years ago. A generation has come up with the younger people only knowing them through their affiliation with Tupac. Maybe it is because they are not real fan friendly or maybe it is because of lack of management, but to remain in the spotlight you need to be out their among the people who respect and have love for you. That is where true legends are built – among the fans, not in dayz past.

 Addition thoughts HERE