Posted on 04/10/2008
Babylon; great city of the ancient world. This Is Babylon; album from Y-Love. I can see where the correlation is presented, but in terms of a solid connection, maybe Cincinnati should have been picked. It's weird, listening to beats as imaginative as those found on Y-Love's album, only to be matched with poor lyricism. The beats, are even more than imaginative, they're fantastic. Large in ever sense, with impressive approach and direction, that progress in a way that would make Timbaland lift an eyebrow. But Y-Love, as he comes to every track, makes us ask "Y?" Like line dancing to a soul jam, his feel is off pace, forced, and contrived.

"Bring It On Down", "Check the Technique", and "Mind Transit" present us with a brief respite from cerebral collapse, but its not enough to make this project tolerable. Optimistically, this provides a great opportunity for improvement, which could come easily from working with the beats to tailor them to Y-Love's cadence. It's not too far fetched to see how that refocusing could help to build an album, whose message would ring clear. Without such, however, This is Babylon is left only a rubble with its positive message left fragmented, and its influence disjointed, much like the words with its beats.

 

- Eavvon O'Neal