Words by Rob P.

Someone really needs to step up to the plate and hammer the Hyphy sound home to the masses, before they get confused. E-40 made it halfway with his release last year, but maybe his bloodline Turf Talk can take it to the bank with his LP ‘West Coast Vaccine’. Apparently Rick Rock’s paws are all over it with the slack taken up by Droop-E and none other than Lil Jon, so the signs are surely promising. Also, if new slumper ‘I Got Chips’, with cousin 40 Water, is anything to go by then it looks like they’re about to go there.

In the meantime, he’s keeping it moving with a double CD that bizarrely (refreshingly?) instead of pushing his own product really serves the purpose of showcasing how innovative and healthy the West Coast is right now. Once you combine the Bay and Cali into one melting pot; the ‘One Blood Remix’ rubbing shoulders with the ‘Vans Remix’ and ‘Ghost Ride It’, longing for a New York revival is the last thing you should be concerning yourself with. The CD even contains it’s own beef section with A-Wax and Husalah going at it hard for all you drama-fiends. Myself, however, will instead be rewinding ‘He’s Fly’ from Balance (are people still sleeping on this dude?) and Federation’s stupidly addictive ‘Rims’. In fact there’s very little filler and so inclusive is the track listing that pretty much all West Coast bosses appear in some shape or form. Oh yeah, the now obligatory Lil Wayne appearance occurs too. Man, Wayne’s becoming like Mad Lion back in 1994.

So in summary, Turf clearly knows who to roll with, but let’s hope his minimal appearance on this CD (a few freestyles etc. aside) is a sign that he’s simply not leaking a haul of classics that are going to make up ‘West Coast Vaccine’, rather than hiding behind the abundance of talent he’s compiled. I’m going to stick my neck out and believe it’s the former, but whether anyone will care or not is a different matter entirely.

My advice? Get the damn album out.

Turf Talk – West Coast Gangsta V.17