WELL..first off i will say that the title for this cd does not fit the contents. "rip the jacker" - i swore was going to be a battle laced tales from the crypt type of album.
Before i review this cd- let's check his history. first cd- just freshly new- tried to satisfy many differ types of music fans- showed us flashes of great abilities but not consistent(thank you wyclef..!)second cd "2000 b.c." came back to answer all his critics with a banging- better produced-probably the best battle laced album ever(showed why he should be considered the best rapper)third- well- i'm a big fan of his- but this cd was weak(c-true hollywood stories). he went independent and released a cd trying to appeal to everyone. there's a couple gems in there but most of it ... like monica lewinsky. everyone wrote him off and said he was done with. that's when canibus went back to the drawing board and dropped "micclub". that release was his very best. i can not believe how intelligent he is. besides a great flow- he has at his disposal a great vast vocabulary. he destroyed eminem in a track lol. now- here comes "rip the jacker". getting stoupe to produce was a dream come true for hardcore canibus fans. this guy is bad azz! his work on jedi mind tricks is great. he is a under-rated producer(i bet if he produced for nelly or 50 cent he would be heralded as much as neptunes or dr. dre) stoupe and cypress hill's producer are top notch! anyways- stoupe matched canibus vocals with heat! instead of using today's and yesterday's usual formula of producing by using james brown or roger and zapp samples- or played out neptunes beats- stoupe uses middle eastern, reggae, spanish/latin music. the content of canibus's flows are very differ to his early work. this was a more mature canibus- displays his intelligence the way most of the ignorant rappers today can't. listeners who can't live without their radio friendly rappers will not like this album(probably just the beats but not the lyrics). i love this album. this is the pinnacle of his career.
Lyrics: 95%
Flow: 90%
Production: 85%
X-Factor: 70%
Overall: 85%