Diamond - Class Is In Session

The trials and tribulations associated with being a female rapper are unevenly proportioned with the good side of the equation. You have to be able to spit hard enough to keep up with your male counterparts, while still maintaining sex appeal that the labels can market. While the ladies of Crime Mob managed to be the main draw of their group, there wasn’t a whole lot of promise that indicated solo careers were necessary. Still kids will be ambitious, as the feisty Princess steps out on her own for the first time on Class Is In Session. But who said it was O.K. for the students to teach? Sounding unenthused and at times extremely lazy makes for course work that is well…elementary.

Most known for rippin’ through singles with intensity as heard on “Rock Yo Hips” and “Stilettos (Pumps)”, Princess flips the script and does a complete 180°, settling for playful subject matter and simplistic lyrics worthy of a dunce cap. The moronic “Hot 16′s” is anything but as advertised as Princess flirts with her “dope-girl” fantasies and drops lines like “Abra-cadabra/I’ll pull your card bitch/you should be ashamed for talkin’ all that hard/shit…” On “Love Or Hate”, our heroine dumbs down to a two-step cadence that makes her sound like she’s reading from a Dr. Seuss storybook, and “Make Me Blush” is a cute club attempt that would make Janet Jackson look like a lyricist.

And the bizarre “Pretty Rave Girl” manages to stretch the LP even thinner when Princess hits lyrical rock bottom with “Crazy here/crazy there/crazy everywhere/throw ya hands in the air/dancin’ like ya just don’t care…” Yeah, how about that dunce cap?

With in-house producer Lil’ Jay delivering audio flatulence on eleven out of the twelve tracks (see the aforementioned “Laffy Taffy” clone “Hot 16′s”), Class Is In Session will likely be put on punishment come report card day. Obviously lacking the guidance of the rest of the group and its managers, Princess has some serious studying to do before she can make claims to any throne. And if she continues to create music that sounds like this, she’s also risking career expulsion.

1 CIGARETTE


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