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"Hello"
How does this album still have 30 minutes left? A slow jam, with Lloyd quoting "Single Ladies" -- jarring, especially after that balls song. "She used to wake up to a kiss, now she wake up to a shoe." What?
"All the Way Gone"
Is this gonna be all easy listening from here on out? Because this is not Game's métier. Mario sings about "looking for love in all the wrong places," confirming that I think I heard it right in the first verse when Game says he hits it from the back and the front and then something about his mama. Walé shows up and that guy is just tuneless.
"Pot of Gold"
Yup, another soft one. Featuring none other than Chris Brown -- isn't this guy's revamped ubiquity gross? [Ed. note: yes] This is the best of the slow ones so far, sadly. "The spotlight is not for me," Brown sings. Please leave then?
"Dr. Dre 2"
I don't know much about gang etiquette, but isn't it like, really dishonoring his dead Crip mom for Game to subsequently "cross the tracks until everything turned red"?
"All I Know"
Just Blaze-y Jay/Ross-style bombast I'm just too tired for this late in the proceedings. Game is, too. I don't really get how the "struggle" Luu Breeze in singing about factors in a sex object whom Game sneers at for her breast and ass implants. Oh, he explains, "I'm sleeping with the enemy." Is he still talking about his Crip mom? And you thought his Dre complex was intense!
"Born in the Trap"
"I was born in the crosshairs without a pot to piss in," is a compelling start, but I'm just too tired. Ever since "All I Know" he's resorted to The Documentary's name-dropping again. Just like T.I., just like Outkast, he was born in the trap. I bet he goes on to name other ATL rappers when he does that part. Yup: Goodie Mob, Ludacris, Shawty Lo. None of which -- I'm sure you already know this -- he's like.
"Mama Knows"
Kind of cool, jazzy beat. I like this one, a quick-shuffled narrative, even though he has no light touch: "[My dad] beating on my moms like her head was a percussion." On the hook is a waning Nelly Furtado, who really does sound like a fucking bird. This has to be the third time on The R.E.D. Album he's compared himself to Malcolm.
"California Dream"
God, this one's annoying, even by chipmunk sample standards. He hates the kid he's about to have. "I ain't cleaning that shit up!" "Kids the best, but they be coming at the worst time!" He should audition for Are We There Yet 3D -- he lives in L.A., I'm sure one of his boys can hook this up. In all seriousness though, it's somewhat amazing to hear him so laser-focused on storytelling, and this one is detailed from his babymama not being able to buckle her car seat to the breathing in the hospital. Wait, did he just say she "gave her life for his baby girl"? Is he being figurative? There's a weird skit afterward where the mama's alive?
"Dr. Dre Outro"
Twist: "Taking care of your family is the most gangsta shit you can do"! This must be how the Juggalos felt after ICP revealed the sixth Joker card was God.
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