Just how real is 50 Cent? Hyped by the likes of Eminem and Dr. Dre as the realest rapper to rise to the fore of the authenticity-starved rap scene, 50 Cent might seem poised to fall short of such daunting expectations.
But 50 Cent has done everything but shortchange his supporters on his new album, "Get Rich or Die Trying."
With his realness brandished and cocked, the Queens native unleashes 27 years of drug hustling and gunslinging over a heavy layer of thick, eerie beats engineered to put the fear of God, and inevitably 50 himself, into the listener.
His realness speaks for itself; 50 needs none of the gristle and growl of rappers who have staked their flows, both cash and lyrical, on ferocity. Tinged with a country drawl, his smooth and effortless delivery lends as much weight to lines like "Like Malcolm by any means wit' my gun in my palm" as a gruffer voice would drain from it.
He's at his realest, and his scariest, on the Dr. Dre-produced "Heat." Laid over the beat of a gun being cocked and fired -- presumably at you -- and the morbid melody of a diabolical organ seemingly on loan from a funeral home, 50 pounds out the poetry of an unscrupulous street assassin: "Don't think you safe 'cause you moved out the hood I'll spray ya momma crib and let yo' ass look for me."
Yet 50 is a self-conscious hustler, and his complexity is the best part of his flow. In "Many Men (Wish Death)," the intoxicating violence of "Heat" seems to saddle 50 with defiant desperation. Here the wrath he relishes meting out hits 50 on the other side of the barrel, and he pleads with his would-be killer: "I thought we was cool/Why you want me to die, homey?"
But once he ducks below the cold reach of the reaper, 50 imputes his survival to some divine purpose that has also, as he unashamedly repeats through-out the album, brought him to the top of the charts, "Now it's clear that I'm here for a real reason/'Cause he got hit like I got hit, but he ain't f--in' breathin'."
Nine bullet scars would give anybody something to rap about, but what sets 50 above the realest of the real is his facility for clever wordplay. Lines like "I got pennies for my thoughts; now I'm rich" and "Roofless [ruthless] like the coupe, but I come wit' more features" are just a few nuggets in an album rich in memorable rhymes.
Despite 50's brazen "realness" and wit, he falls into the cliches that have served as the life support for the dying rap scene of late.
No corporate rapper is complete without his punk of a nemesis, and guess what? 50 really hates Ja Rule. "Back Down" assaults Ja on all the qualities a real gangsta holds dear, encapsulated in the line "You's a Pop Tart sweetheart/you soft in the middle/I eat you fo' breakfast." Expect Ja's comeback to be released this summer.
And is a big-time rapper complete without bragging about how many drugs he does? The track "High All the Time" insists that musicians and gangstas do massive quantities of drugs and that rappers prefer marijuana to all other forms of intoxicant. Who would have guessed?
And is a rapper complete without avowing his indifference to all aspects of women, minus sexuality and mommas? A slick, steel-drum driven beat is wasted on the self-explanatory "P.I.M.P.," one of the many examples that beg the question: Should we take seriously 50's confession (on "21 Questions") that he fears losing love if he loses his fame, in the face of formidable evidence that he has no love for hos?
It's hard to say. Perhaps his fear of losing his newfound fame is real, but it's hard to believe that he truly loves women, with lines like "I'm starin' at ya/Tryin' to figure out how you got in them jeans."
50 also uses some of these molds deftly. The compulsory party anthem "In Da Club" is one you won't be hearing the end of soon -- it's that good. The sing-alongs taken straight from childhood ("Go shorty, it's ya birfday") and an almost-too-catchy beat of ultra-serious violins and cadent clapping won't get out of your head, especially with the song's heavy airtime on MTV and BET.
A barrage of guest artists is another trend that, thankfully, 50 didn't feel obliged to follow. Emimem -- whose support helped lift 50 Cent from obscurity to stardom -- puts in his two cents on two tracks, and a couple of homies from 50's home-grown G-Unit add a few forgettable lines, but otherwise 50 pilots all the tracks.
The movie-inspired-by-the-album cliche takes on a new but also self-serving twist on the CD. The movie contained on the bonus DVD is nothing but a backhanded attempt at reinforcing 50's real reputation, as if the album didn't provide ample proof.
The other bonuses on the CD are keepers though. "Wanksta," of "8 Mile" soundtrack fame, showcases some of the best lyrics on the album: "Niggas say they gon' murder 50 how?/We ride around wit' guns the size of Lil' Bow Wow."
"U Not Like Me" is another testament to 50's harsh history, laden with more clever explanations of how 50 inexplicably made it out: "See, I been to the pearly gates/They turned me back/See the good die young/I ain't eligible fo' that."
There are real reasons why 50 is still here and on top of the charts: he's damn talented and too real. Despite its faults, "Get Rich or Die Tryin'" is the best that gangsta rap has had to offer in too long of a time.
