{"id":552157,"date":"2026-07-21T10:57:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T10:57:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/552157\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T10:57:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T10:57:11","slug":"buckshot-the-package-rapreviews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/552157\/","title":{"rendered":"Buckshot :: The Package \u2013 RapReviews"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nobody has to nag me on social media or drop me a line<\/a> by email to get a Buckshot album reviewed. I\u2019ve gone on the record before saying he\u2019s one of my favorite emcees dating all the way back to \u201cEnta Da Stage\u201d from Black Moon \u2014 so much so that it hurts my heart<\/a> to give him a bad review. I lack the magical ability to turn chicken shit into chicken salad, so I\u2019m going to call it like I see it, but one bad effort doesn\u2019t make one man a bad artist. Everybody can have a bad day or a period where they are stagnant creatively. As Buckshot says on \u201cWhat I Bring to the Table\u201d though, \u201cTimes change. Rhymes change. Minds change, nigga, design change.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2018m only here to do what I\u2019m supposed to.\u201d It\u2019s good to hear him doing it on \u201cThe Package<\/a>.\u201d There are some emcees who just say words, there are some who show off their incredible vocabulary but don\u2019t actually sound good rhyming, and then there are some emcees who are just naturally fluid and flow like water. Rakim. Buckshot. Lyrics Born. The late Gift of Gab. I could go on with a list but you get the gist. Listening to Buckshot rap on these tracks is listening to a man with inner confidence in his craft. If you\u2019re a long-time listener that\u2019s no surprise. What might surprise you the most here is that the entire album is self-produced by Buckshot. No Beatminerz. No DJ Premier. It\u2019s just Kenyatta Blake.<\/p>\n

The fact it looks like a four piece band is playing behind him on the cover perfectly suits songs like \u201cJust Stop.\u201d It\u2019s clich\u00e9 as fuck at this point to call Black Moon\u2019s debut album \u201chighly influential,\u201d but it was around that time that rappers on the East coast and their producers began to explore a new jazz influence in their music. You can debate who started it, and if you said Gang Starr I wouldn\u2019t argue it (I\u2019d probably argue for it), but Buckshot\u2019s melodic delivery soars over notes like Donald Byrd\u2019s \u201cWind Parade.\u201d He knows it too so acting as his own producer he plays to his strengths on songs like \u201cAll Fans.\u201d I feel like I just walked into a night spot on Bourbon Street and found one jazz cat playing a keyboard and another lightly tapping a snare with a wire brush.<\/p>\n

So Buckshot is an emcee\u2019s emcee, one who cares deeply about his craft, and one who also understands what kind of music he sounds good on. His assets are valuable in the abstract, but what about in the concrete world of bars? Well this is another area Buckshot excels at on this album. It\u2019s easy to brag and boast, highpost and toast, and talk about how fly your material possessions are and how much everybody hates your success. Buckshot would sound good doing it too, and he does indulge an occasional bar of boasting now and then, but he\u2019s far more interested in talking about topics and telling you stories. \u201cHome is no home in the city I roam\u201d is how \u201cNight Stress\u201d starts, and from that moment forward you know he and General Steele (Smif-N-Wessun) are going to take you on a journey.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the young to the grown, back to the young, back to the grown folks who relyin\u2019 on them. You never realize what you\u2019re doin\u2019, \u2019til it\u2019s all in ruins and you\u2019re still out brewin\u2019.\u201d It might not go down as the most intricately conceived rhyme structure put to pen, but there\u2019s more to be said for using smaller words effectively than larger words absurdly. It\u2019s the almost effortlessly way Buckshot delivers his bars here that lets you know it\u2019s anything BUT easy. He thought about how it would sound, kept his body in great physical shape so his breath control wouldn\u2019t fail him, then artfully delivered those vocals to the beat. He makes it sound like one take, but since this is a self-produced album, let\u2019s say at least three. He was perfecting each track from the beginning to the closer.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as you step in the room, you see a star\/legend on the set, I\u2019m blessing them with a bar.\u201d I\u2019d be lying if I didn\u2019t tell you the hair on my arms stood up hearing him say it. There aren\u2019t too many rappers dead or living who make me feel that way, and even though he\u2019s earned the right to be cocky, Buckshot is still humble on \u201cThe Package<\/a>\u201d far beyond what he needs to be. \u201cI don\u2019t got time for those who play hard\/but I got second for those who pay homage \u2013 like y\u2019all.\u201d It\u2019s a simple formula. You give Buckshot respect, he\u2019s giving it right back. I respect the man and this album, and even though I was skeptical about it being self-produced, I can\u2019t find one track to say \u201cman that one didn\u2019t work.\u201d They\u2019re all good and some are outstanding so you need to check this shit out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nobody has to nag me on social media or drop me a line by email to get a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552158,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[146,85,46,409],"class_list":["post-552157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=552157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}