Fort Minor In Emceeing

Fort Minor
"The Rising Tied"
(Machine Shop/Warner)

A few years ago, I was asked to interview the members of an up and coming band called Linkin Park. When I met the two members of the group (the DJ and bass player) who I was supposed to talk to, I was asked to leave them alone because they were "trying to get pussy" (DJ Joe Hahn's words, not mine). Instead the opening group, Styles of Beyond, gave me an interview, and I laughed at Linkin Park's elementary brand of crappy rap rock and subpar Deftones imitation. Over the years, I simply ignored Linkin Park to the point where I didn't realize they still existed; but I actually thought that I should give lead rapper Mike Shinoda's Fort Minor alter ego an objective review, so here we are.

Like many hip-hop releases, Fort Minor's strength lies on the shoulders of its guests rather than it's main artists, so while Mike Shinoda isn't the crappiest MC, he's clearly not in the league of his Fort brethren, Styles of Beyond; don't even get me started on how he's dusted by the Roots' Black Thought, Celph Titled or Common.

One interesting collaboration that caught my attention was Onelinedrawing/Gratitude/Far's voicebox Jonah Matranga singing the hook on "Red To Black." I'm assuming that was the workings of Warner's A&R people since Gratitude was on Atlantic. Well, the song isn't that good anyway.

Shinoda tries to do the whole "I'm a creative MC" metaphor in "Cigarettes," but it's pretty stupid. Nas should sue him for stealing the idea and cadence from "I Gave You Power."

The drum loops pretty much sound the same: basic, sterile and processed loops that come with any program for your PC or Mac; it's made to sound like an MPC, but it comes off very amatuer-ish, which I guess is something you can expect from a first time MC, but for someone who bagged Jay-Z to do the intro for their album, I would've expected more. Maybe a Primo beat, or Pete Rock, or MF Doom? I can't stress how generic this album sounds....

Given the the amount of time and money put into this record, it pains me to think that Prozack Turner's album will never see the light of day, but Mike Shinoda and Fort Minor pissed away their major label bucks on backpacker hip-hop that would've sounded better 10 years ago. I guess I wouldn't go out of my way to buy "The Rising Tied," but I'm not going to kill anybody who's playing it. Yet. Give it two weeks, I might be sharpening my knives.