Get Low Records Presents Memphis Bleek: Feed The Streets

My question is, how can Bleek feed the streets? Has he eaten at all during his rap career? Off his own strength I mean. I remember a time when Bleek was supposed to be the heir to the Dynasty throne. But since The Dynasty album he’s been in obscurity at best. A few years later he created a small as Webster buzz again when he dropped a diss record aimed towards The Game. But that went nowhere and neither did Bleek.

Now here we have his latest mixtape, Feed The Streets, but the question is does the street still hunger for whatever Bleek’s been cooking up? This isn’t the same energetic, flame spitting Bleek that was riding with Jay for free and talking about ballin’ till he fallin’ in the late 90s. Far from it actually. He seems bland with it now. Even on the up-tempo “Protect Ya Neck” beat, Bleek sounds laid back and nonchalant when he spit, “Get Low general/’nuff respect due – to the big homie/ya know me/the one and only/play with me like a child/I’ll leave you holy moly/and I’m hood, so what the fuck is niggas telling me/wane be my dog? Then you better know the pedigree/whole team strapped, everybody got a felony/and I ain’t buying the bullshit that you sellin’ me.” The same uninspired sounding Bleek could be found on joints like “Real Nigga Shit,” “Ah Man,” and “Mothafucker.” It almost sounded like Bleek’s lost his passion for this rap game.

There were one or two moments where Bleek seemed to actually give a f*ck whether he was trying to lock a flow over “New Yae Beat” or has himself going into retro mode with A Tribe Called Quest classic instrumental on “Gotta Put Me On.” But two decent joints isn’t gonna justify the creation of a whole mixtape.

While Bleek was never really considered a lyrical beast or rhyme monster, he was always considered a rapper that was hungry. But with Feed The Streets he sounds like he’s had his fill of the game. All his rhymes are about money, hoes and clothes cause I guess that’s all the niqqa know. That’s all good and dandy, but at least word it cleverly or use metaphors that haven’t been recycled by every rapper in the game. Bleek sounds like he’s just rapping to rap. Like when he said “And I will hurt you/I will merc you/as you can see there aren’t any squares in my circle,” on “I Got My Locs On.” It just seemed like he put no effort into that or into most of this mixtape.

Jay once rhymed, “Bleek been one hit away his whole career.” But if this project is any indication of the platinum ambitions Memph has left, then it’s probably safe to say that Memph is going to be depending off the streets instead of the other way around. Good for him Jay followed that first line about Bleek with, “As long as I’m alive he’s a millionaire/and even if I die he’s in my will somewhere/so he can kick back and chill somewhere.” Dame Dash on the other hand got a whole different kind of rhyme written for him…-The Infamous O

Hottest Joint: “Gotta Put Me On”

Weakest Joint: “Ah Man”