Posted on 04/27/2009
UGK 4 Life is an apt final chapter to a career marked by almosts, what ifs, and could have beens. Could 1996’s Ridin’ Dirty, the regional classic from Port Arthur, Texas’s Underground Kingz have stood as the definitive masterwork of the era’s southern sound, had it not been for the slightly more accessible sounds emanating from a dungeon in ATL? What if label politics hadn’t delayed the much anticipated follow up, and the group had been allowed to fully ride the crest of show stealing verses on Jay-Z’s “Big Pimpin”? And in 2008, fresh off the gold selling success of an epic comeback album, an overdue ascension to star status was almost at hand. Tragically, the untimely passing of Chad “Pimp C” Butler turned this, their sixth album, from what should have been a coronation, into a premature punctuation mark.

The good news is, this is not a posthumous cut and paste job. Recorded by the duo in the month’s prior to Butler’s death, UGK For Life bubbles with the easy chemistry and soul drenched sonics that characterize their best material. Pimp’s nasal animation bounces impeccably off of Bun’s X-Acto sharp flow on “The Pimp & The Bun,” making the trunk ready heater as timeless as the bluesy, politically stoked “Purse Comes First” is timely. While it would have been easy to turn the album into a star-studded tribute, all of the guests (with the exception of the ubiquitous Akon on the misguided, “Hard As Hell”), feel right at home on a UGK project. Raheem Devaughn makes it three for three in his pairings with the Kingz, soaking the guitar driven banger, “Still On the Grind,” with his signature vocal gusto, while E-40, B-Legit, and 8Ball & MJG make “Used To Be” a tour de force of veteran swagger. Lil’ Boosie and Webbie help Pimp finally turn his oft referenced reverence for the au naturale into a full-fledged homage on “Harry A**hole,” and the result is one of ‘09’s guiltiest pleasures.

It’s hard not to get the feeling that had Pimp lived long enough to knock out a few more sessions, nondescript fillers like “Feelin’ You” and “She Luv It” would probably have ended up on the cutting room floor. But when the rumbling electric bass line kicks in over the stuttered drums on, “Swishas & Erb,” it feels like we’re getting a glimpse of where Chad was about to take the group’s sound as he got more comfortable with modern production techniques. With Bun flowing like warm maple syrup beside the southern fried falsetto of Sleepy Brown, we are left to grapple with the conspicuous absence of a Pimp C verse, and wonder what if...

- Jeff Harvey