Soul Survivor, Vol. 2

Excellent

Not the same old classless radio play you always hear. Love the tracks with CL Smooth, Lil Brother & Talib...CLASSIC

Like all songs on this album. A true classic and a must have. For all true hip hop listeners only

I must say that I'm disappointed in Pete Rock. On his other albums, the production is flawless on nearly every track. On here, there's upwards of 5 weak tracks. I never thought Pete would drop an album with that many lame songs. I think one thing that brings it down is that Pete Rock doesn't even use his traditional jazzy and smooth style on most of the tracks. When I saw the tracklist and featured mcs I knew this album probably wouldn't be as good as the original Soul Survivor lyrically. I was counting on Pete Rock's beats to keep me interested. Aside from that, subject matter is weak on a lot of the tracks too.On "It's the Postaboy", Postaboy just sounds like some generic G-Unit or Dipset carbon copy mc. Pete should've known better than to work with this garbage rapper. This song sounds like it's made for the 106&Park audience rather than Pete Rock's true fans. The beat is bad too. One of the worst I've ever heard from Pete Rock. It sounds like an attempt at making a party anthem for teenagers which is out of character for Pete. Now I usually like Pharoahe Monch but "Just Do It" is just plain weak. The beat is lifeless and Monch just comes off as plain annoying on this song. I thought the track called "Head Rush" with GZA and RZA would be good but it's lame too. GZA spits only a short verse and the song only lasts for about 2 minutes. Again, the production is disappointing. "We Good" with Kardinal Offishall is on the mediocre side as well. I'm not impressed with Kardinal Offishall's flow on this song. So the mc part of this song is lame. I can't say that Pete Rock's production is bad on this track but it's just missing something. There's no soul in it. Now for the real downer of the album. "Warzone" with Dead Prez is just plain awful. Undoubtedly THE WORST beat Pete Rock has EVER made. I didn't even believe he was capable of producing something this bad. This song sounds like a beat Master P or the Ying Yang Twins would rhyme over. It's terrible. There is nothing good about this song at all. The verses from Dead Prez suck too.Now this album isn't all bad, let me tell you the good sides of it. The spoken word track called "Truth Is" featuring Black Ice is good. You should pay attention to his words on this song, especially if you're a relatively new hip-hop fan. The songs with Krumbsnatcha, Skillz, Slum Village, and J-Dilla have better production and better verses too. So the core of this album isn't all bad. The R&B cut with Leela James was a highlight for the album as well. Now the best tracks by far are the cuts that feature CL Smooth. "Appreciate" is reminiscent of the Main Ingredient days and "It's a Love Thing" is a golden track as well. "Fly Till I Die" has a dope beat and only has CL Smooth on the hook. Talib Kweli brings down the song with his annoying voice and flow. Aside from the CL Smooth songs, the big standout of the album is the soulful "Give It To Ya" with Little Brother. Pete Rock's production shined on this song and the members of Little Brother dropped some meaningful lyrics.As an overall album this disc isn't bad. It's actually pretty good, however if you're a long time Pete Rock fan like me then you'd know why 5 weak tracks is disappointing. It seems that my favorite producers are slipping with the times. First Premo on The Ownerz and now Pete Rock with this. The fact that the tracks with CL Smooth shined brighter than the rest of the album makes me long for them to do another full LP together.My rating: 3.5/5 (closer to 3.75)

I just bought this album on it's Tuesday release date. And I said to myself, that I'll let this album soak in my ears for a few days before I review anything. I'll have to agree with some of the other reviewers here, this is a disappointing album, especially due to what we normally expect from Pete Rock. The same guy that hit us with Mecca & The Soul Brotha, The Main Ingredient, Center Of Attention, Soul Survivor I, and Petestrumentals. Maybe Pete's trying to become more of an eclectic producer nowadays, because half of these tracks don't have that signature traditional jazzy smooth touch that we normally expect from Pete. Unfortunately it isn't successful here on Soul Survivor II. Half of these tracks just come off as sounding a little rushed and mediocre. It seems as if he's making his beats this time in order to cater to the featured MC rather than have the featured MC cater to his beats. On top of that, there's little to no subject matter displayed. It just sounds like one big posse cut. Some of the low points of this album were "It's tha Postaboy"...somebody tell this Bama to go back to 106 & Park were the 15 year olds can celebrate him, this is supposed to be grown folks music here. "Head Rush" feat. RZA and The GZA is just one verse short and the beat sounds like Pete Rock attempting to mimic a RZA sound. It just doesn't correspond well with the 2 MCs. "Just Do It" with Pharaoh Monch really wasn't doing it for me either, it sounded like some music played during a Tae-Bo tape workout....I'ma long time O.K. fan but I just couldn't feel the rawness or the soul on this song. "Warzone" with Dead Prez is hands down the wackest song of the entire album, somebody please tell me that Pete Rock didn't produce this cut, it sounds like a 69 Boys song on crack. And also, where is Pete's verses at??? He isn't a talented MC but his delivery and his voice have always been appreciated by fans. You only hear Pete Rock on some of the song's choruses.However, A few of the other songs featuring artists like Krumbsnatcha, Talib, Kardinal Official, JAy Dilla, Skillz, and Slum Village were much better all together but still, the production just seemed to have that missing ingredient to it. All of the tracks with CL Smooth were magnificent and nostalgic at the same time. Next to the Pete Rock and CL Smooth reunion cuts. "Give it 2 Ya" feat. Little Brother is probably the steal of the show. Despite what some of the other reviewers may think, the intro to the album with the Black Ice spoken word portion is extremely powerful laced with important words and thoughts that Hip Hop's next generation should pay close attention to.To sum it all up Soul Survivor 2 has some hits and some misses. OF course you would expect a more complete album from Pete Rock due to what we are accustomed to. But in comparison to this album's contemporaries it can hold it's own weight. Not every album's a classic, some are just good. Definitely pick this up if you are a true Pete Rock fan.

1997 war es, als Pete Rock mit SOUL SURVIVOR Teil 1 das letzte Producer-Album dieser Reihe vorlag, und die Herzen der Hip Hop begeisterten im Sturm eroberte... (dazwischen eine Doppel-Instrumental CD und eine Kollabo-CD mit 9th Wonder, sowie 4 gemeinsame Alben mit seinem Partner CL Smooth, das fünfte soll angeblich Anfang 2005 kommen)Nun liegt mir sein aktuelles Werk, SOUL SURVIVOR 2 vor, bei dem mich vor allem interessiert hat, ob er an seine Leistung von über 7 Jahren anknüpfen kann, und dabei auch manch neuen Einfluß in seine Werke bringt, ohne dabei aufgesetzt zu wirken.Die Gästeliste hört sich schonmal vielversprechend an, aber kein Wunder bei einem Mann wie Pete Rock, den MCees aus Ost- und West respektieren....da wären:Black Ice, Kardinal Offishall, Pharoahe Monch, Little BrotherPostaboy, natürlich C.L. Smooth, Denosh, Skillz, KrumbsnatchaLeela James, RZA and GZA, Talib Kweli, Dead Prez, Slum Villageund J-Dilla; Die Beats sind alle ausschliesslich von Pete Rock himself produziert.Fazit dieser CD:Beim ersten Durchhören spürt man den Vibe, man merkt, daß diese Songs zum Großteil nicht nur Ohrwürmer für ein paar Wochen sind, sondern auch noch so manches Ohr verzaubern werden, wenn sie mal ein paar Jahre auf dem Buckel haben - besonders der extra feine und langsame Track mit CL Smooth "Its a love thing", und die erste Single mit Dead Prez "Warzone" darf man ruhig schon jetzt als Klassiker ansehen. Und wie immer sind es die basslastigen Lines in Verbindung mit den knackigen Jazz- und Oldschoolsamples, die sich quer durch die CD ziehen und zu begeistern wissen.Feinster "Good old Pete Rock" Sound also, und der definitive Beweis, daß es noch so manche ALTE EISEN gibt, die IMMER NOCH im Stande sind, ihr einstiges Level beizubehalten bzw. nochmal einen draufzulegen - sollte in keinem Regal fehlen!!

Bei diesem Line Up von hochkarätigen Künstlern können eigentlich keine schlechten Tracks herauskommen. So ist es auch. Nur hätte ich von Pete Rock bei einer Schaffenspause von fast 6 Jahren für den Nachfolger von Soul Survivor deutlich mehr erwartet. Das vorliegende Album hätte Pete Rock mit seinen enormen Fähigkeiten locker in einem Jahr fertig stellen können. Also wieso diese Verzögerung? Ok, Pete hat schon Recht. HipHop braucht gerade jetzt gute Alben, wie er im Interview seinen Standpunkt vertrat.Aber von Pete Rock kann man wohl auch jedes Jahr ein gutes HipHop Album gebrauchen. Zurück zum Album;Diesen richtigen Wow Effekt habe ich nur bei folgenden Tracks gespürt."Give it to ya" mit Little Brother und das etwas kurze "Head Rush" mit Rza und Gza. Die Tracks mit C.L. Smooth (Pete's früherer Partner) gehören auch zu den Besseren, für mich passt dieser MC aber irgendwie nicht mehr in mein Weltbild von HipHop 2004. Sorry an die Fans von Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth. Jeder hat seine Meinung.Versteht mich jetzt bitte nicht falsch. Tracks wie "Beef", "Just do it" und "Da Villa" gefalllen sicherlich vielen HipHop Hörern.Aber wie ich schon im Titel zweifellos Stellung bezogen habe, das ist nicht DER Pete Rock, den ich mir gewünscht habe. Wenn es Euch auch so erging, bitte meine Rezension mit Ja bewerten.