Strickly My Opinion: Ja Rule "The Mirror"

Sooooo, over the weekend along with Slaughterhouse's album, Crooked I' "The Art of The Freestlye Vol. 2", and a few other mix cds, I downloaded Ja Rule's new/old cd "The Mirror". Now anyone who knows me knows that I was a big supporter of Jeffrey even before he was signed to DefJam (via Murder Inc, now The Inc). Back when Murder Inc. was originally a group comprised of Ja, DMX, and Jay-z. I'm talking before X or Jay-z had Def Jam behind them to push the button on their careers. I actually still own every Ja cd from "Venni Vetti Vecci" to "R.U.LE." A lot of people stopped listening to Ja because a guy named Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson told them to. I never stopped listening to Ja but grew very tired of every song he put out being a pop song and not a rap track.(mind you today that wouldn't matter because there is almost no line between the two). I wanted that hardcore rap that I had come to love from the mixtapes and that you could find buried in the albums, but all that was being pushed or played were the commercial pop hits. Now I understand why this was the route they took but I wasn't feeling it.

The second reason I stopped checking for Jeffrey was because I lost a little respect for him over the whole "battle" with 50. It wasn't even the fact that he "lost" the battle. He should have just stayed in his lane and kept doing what he was both known for doing and what he was making money doing. It was cool when he made his diss tracks for the mix cds and all but, to allow another man to play you out of your position was just not a good look. I mean he let 50 affect an entire cd worth of material and that cd ,"Blood In My Eye", was not only horrible, but sold the least amount of units than any of his releases. In any case you know how the rest of the story plays out.

Fast forward some 5 or 6 years later and Ja is just known as 50's come up. The butt of joke after joke. Ja has been quietly playing the background. I mean this album was due to be released over a year ago and even had 2 singles(one featuring Lil Wayne at that) and failed to gain any momentum. On the other end 50 Cent seems to be going through similar growing pains. I mean it took what 5 singles before his last cd gained any traction? And this new cd, "Before I Self Destruct" (which is due to drop next month) still doesn't have a lead single or any buzz
surrounding it.

Back to "The Mirror", I attempted to sit and listen to this cd 4 times over the weekend. Every time I started to listen I was either distracted, interrupted, or just plain lost interest after a couple tracks in. I finally forced myself to listen to it in its entirety today while driving and its actually not horrible. Let me explain. You see, its not that Ja can't rap anymore, its that I don't want to hear Ja rap anymore. I'm just not interested. This cd sounds just like previous Ja cd's. (sans the big name features) The problem with that is I don't know if that is a good or bad thing. I mean all of his previous cds except "Blood In My Eye" moved units using the same blueprint/formula. Hell, even "R.U.L.E." was certified gold and that was his worse cd(again,except "Blood In My Eye"). The problem here is that Ja was before his time. Had he been a new artist with this same type of "sing-songy" flow a couple years ago, he would be praised and critically acclaimed for being "innovative" and "a breath of fresh air". But because he has been doing this for years, and because most of us are now tired of this new influx of rappers trying to sing, it doesn't work. Look what happened to Nelly and even 50 to a certain extent. I mean as much as the "innanets" love Weezy F. Baby, he's even getting some backlash over all the singing. Same with Kanye West. Lets be real, Ja is one of the few rappers that can actually sing without the help of auto tune and could effortlessly transition between rapping and singing, but in order for him to move units today he'd have to have a reality show on vh1 or find a way to get the original Murder Inc. (Ja, Jay-z, DMX) back together. Yea, I'd bet on the former too...

Download "The Mirror" Here...