Tony Yayo:Bloody Xmas

All I can say about the cover to this mixtape is damn. Yayo got Game chopped in half and struggling to get up. Fat Joe and Irv Gotti (talk about unnecessary) heads on the floor, but worse of all, he got Young Buck’s head toppin’ off the Christmas tree. This man is more loyal to 50 Cent than Starscream was to Megatron. You don’t see Banks going at them with the same intensity Yayo does.

But aside from the G’d up cover, this man might be too G’d up to keep on rapping. I swear to God, he’s getting lazy with it. At one point Yayo was my favorite G-Unit MC. The energy, the poise, the criminally insane lyrics – he was that niqqa. Now he’s just talking about being gangsta and bragging about what money’s gotten him (50’s money to be exact) and how many girls he’s slaying.

Just from the look of the cover I was expecting son to come out with guns blazing. When I heard the beat to 2Pac & Bone Thugs “Thug Luv” drop I got hype thinking Yayo was fixin’ to go in on that joint. His flow never sounded so unmotivated. His lyrics were eh (money, guns & girls) and his delivery is far from the “gone postal” style he’s known for. To get on a classic Tupac track and not absolutely destroy it or match its appeal is straight blasphemy.

Also the interludes that were ripped from A Christmas Story really threw me off. The hell was he snorting when he thought it would be a good idea to use that film’s audio for his mixtape?

One of the few bright spots of the mixtape was “Bloody Xmas” where he took Nas’ “Shoot ‘Em Up” beat and concept, but even that was composed mostly with his 3 favorite subjects. “Five .45’s / two G-5’s / 6 groupies and they all wanna fly / 10 Dom P’s / 10 Rosay’s / 10 groupies, 5 niggas / that’s 5 menages…” I miss the Talk Of New York that once said, “You can sniff me, cut me / I’ll turn you to a junkie / I’m the number one seller in the whole f*ckin’ country / Wall Street niggas, they copp me on the low / white boys don’t call me coke, they call me blow…” Whew! He was killin it with the creativity and the authority when he spit.

Now his authority when he spits is weaker than Fat Joe in a Boston Market and what he’s saying is as predictable as yesterday’s lotto numbers. He must be mad bored with this rap shit cause he even hopped on Movado’s “So Special” and spit a verse so half assed that that it could be Amy Winehouse’s whole ass. That’s how weak it was.

Man, I’m disappointed. I was really looking forward to some gangsta shit from the Talk Of New York, but the money & groupies have struck again. They’ve spoiled another MC’s artistic drive and creativity to the point where he feels everything he drops is the sh*t no matter what. That’s what happens when you surround yourself with a bunch of Marv Alberts (“Yes!” men). -The Infamous O

Hottest Joint: "Delt With"

Weakest Joint: "So Special"