It's September 08, 2026, 04:06:17 PM
The Aroma still my song of the year I think...just has that classic East Coast mid 90s feels in a way, plus a great hook. I'll check the rest of the album to see if anything else hits
Organized Rhyme finds Bronx icon Fat Joe returning to classic, brass-heavy New York street rap over polished, anthem-scale production from Cool & Dre. At 36 minutes across 12 tracks, the album features soul chops, booming 808s, and cinematic horns tailored for Joe's larger-than-life presence. Pusha T trades sharp cocaine-rap bars on "Set of Keys," while Stove God Cooks lends his signature hook work to "The Aroma" and "Not Goin'." Terror Squad royalty Remy Ma joins for "Dead or Alive," and CeeLo Green provides soulful hooks on "2 Plots." We liked Fat Joe in his early DITC days and some of his Big Pun collabos, but kinda lost touch with him when he tried to have one leg in the streets and one in the pop charts. This is a pretty strong project though, with some dope beats and reflective content that fits this stage of his life and career.
Album Review: Organized Rhyme by Fat JoeWith his twelfth album, Fat Joe folds the deaths of his mother, his father, and a brother into the crime talk he has run since Represent, and the grief makes every boast believable.(Shatter the Standards and Rafael Greene)There was the story about the stickup kid from Trinity Avenue who robbed a whole gym‚ every man inside‚ and came away with a legend․ Fat Joe has told that one for over thirty years‚ and the repeats just kept coming as the people who were there went to prisons and graveyards․ He came up through Diggin' in the Crates and built Terror Squad; Big Pun reached the world on his arm․ Through all of it‚ the gym stayed the question strangers asked him most‚ and the men who could answer it went to the ground or to the feds․ This left Joe telling his version longer and louder than anybody on that block․All that telling found a second home on microphones built for it․ He shares a podcast with Jadakiss now‚ hours of two New Yorkers walking back through the eighties and nineties․ The audience takes the stories the way it takes history‚ since the survivor in the room is the closest thing to a source the era has left․ His mother's death he has talked through on air and in interviews‚ out loud and at length․ The gym is a story only he can tell‚ though with Cool & Dre and the subject matter‚ and Organized Rhyme‚ it's some of his best work in decades․For "They Wanna Know‚" he beats the strangers to the asking himself these days‚ on his own song․ Down to the one that follows him everywhere: "Is the story facts or cap?" Whether he really robbed that gym sits inside the chant too‚ next to the trap and the Fever‚ and Don Cartagena answers by going darker than the questions․ He led a crime wave in ‘88‚ the verse goes‚ moved heroin across state lines‚ held a man for days with a hot iron until the debt got paid․ He gives it in bulk‚ the wave‚ the states‚ the days‚ and keeps the particulars for himself‚ and the verse rounds off with the hundred times they shot at him back in the day․ But the refrain hides one gentler answer‚ a woman who cooked pasta‚ salad‚ and steak‚ who asked him for nothing while he played hard until he lost her‚ "Played myself playin' hard‚ wish I had her today․" Her table sits in the same song as the torture․Likewise‚ CeeLo Green gives more than a little sermon on "2 Plots" about living a worthy life that will let you live if you respect it‚ and Joe's verse comes back off a year that showed him little respect: he slept in his momma's bed just the other night‚ by his own telling․ Try giving thanks when your brother died on Thanksgiving‚ he raps‚ then it's to his son Joey‚ born with Down syndrome and‚ absent since birth‚ to the hospice where he watches his pops dying with the footage of somebody's testimony playing. To the couplet that gives the song its title‚ the burial and the cemetery and the landfill staring each other down and the landfill in it waiting for whichever of his mans starts singing to the feds․The Dre hook Joe has on "Set of Keys" is one bar repeating: "I saved a life with a set of keys/My brother died with a set of keys․" The key for the car trades off with the kilo․ Pusha T drives through with his "the best rapper who ain't died yet" line that doubles as headcount; how many men are dead on this song․ Joe ends saying his soul's been cold since his momma died‚ and that somebody's momma's gonna cry over anybody who plays with the Don․ Jadakiss asks the question that cuts at every man in this company: "Is this about a verse‚ or is this about a career?" Is that you‚ 38 Spesh? He remembers when the block still called dope P-blow‚ glad above all that the RICO missed him․ On "The Aroma‚" Stove God Cooks smells his own work from Rome to the Amalfi Coast to Dubai‚ kilos out the plastic‚ glass pipes burning‚ everything cooked in that kitchen answering to his name․ The hundred million Joe says he made off the stove rides the same smell‚ told for true․Remy Ma‚ the only one to tell it from inside the family‚ packs the grief before the joke․ Imagine on imagine․ "Tryna survive while tryna mourn": mourning and surviving inside one breath․ If each breath is true‚ what isn't true becomes truer․ She laughs at her own myth on the way through‚ a fortune off one hit song that she concedes really happened․ "Dead or Alive" saves her needle for Joe: "You was in the gym gettin' robbed by Joe Crackers‚" one detail attached‚ no gun‚ the stickup retold bare-handed by the woman who has heard him tell it longest․ Mike Brown was a champion coach by June and said laughingly that part of his title was a haze․ Fat Joe sat courtside‚ where the Garden has kept a seat warm for him for decades‚ and jumped with each Knicks bucket as the sights and sounds of his chains caught the house lights above him․ Brown said‚ "They just‚ they blinded me․" Joe outlived the corners and the courtrooms and most of the men who shared his story‚ and the whole city watched him celebrate in the brightest seat in the building․Great (★★★★☆)Favorite Track(s): "2 Plots," "Dead or Alive," "Set of Keys"
Home
Help
Login
Register
Print
