Young Jeezy - Thug Motivation

Genre hip hop Publisher Def Jam External Links Official Website Def Jam

"Ay"

One of the first things you notice about Thug Motivation is that Young Jeezy and his guests seem to constantly be singing/shouting or saying "Ay." As the record starts amidst techno stabbing synth you hear "Ay." As I began to consider this almost primal chant I realized this certainly isn't the first place I've heard this. It's sprinkled in a lot of crunk songs amoungst other almost guttural sounds. In the past four years the eye of the mainstream has been focused keenly on the "Dirty" South and the sound of Crunk. Not since the dominance of West Coast rap in the mid-90s has Hip-Hop been so geographically homogeneous. When it emerged, Crunk was already futuristic and alien sounding, but it has evolved at such a quick rate with producers constantly pushing the boundaries, perhaps culminating in the Ying Yang Twins' "Wait," where the beat just seems to rumble and click while the raps are whispered over the top. While it's easy - perhaps with the benefit of hindsight - to pick out West Coast rap's definitive albums it seems that the nature of Crunk means that every big new release is its definitive release. Now what I'm about to say will seem throwaway after that but, more than any other album I've heard this year from the South, Young Jeezy's Thug Motivation is the definitive Crunk album.

The record is messy. It's all over the place, but surely that's what "Dirty" South should be? After five tracks of what can't be mistaken for anything other than Crunk we get presented with "Go Crazy," a Curtis Mayfield sampling track that sounds more like a Kanye West production than Lil' Jon. And then after that we're back to Crunk again. You get the impression that Young Jeezy has stumbled onto this sound of his own accord and its sonic relation to other similar records is merely coincidental. It's not, of course; as a former record executive Jeezy knows exactly what his sound is and where it comes from. But he seems so excited to have discovered it. "Trap Star" is representative of everything great about Crunk. On it Young Jeezy sounds desperate - it's like American Idol when a singer is singing for survival and there's that added dimension of passion; despite their vocal limitations there's the feeling that the singer is on a cliff edge desperately trying to scramble back to safe ground. On "Trap Star" Young Jeezy is at the cliff edge, the synthesized horns serenading him one last time, the line "I'm so materialistic/So well connected/Just ax about it/So well respected," sounding less of a boast than a desperate man using past achievements as a crutch. Even the trademark "Ay" is feint.

Thug Motivation comes off like more of a greatest hits than a debut record. There are no skits, which is refreshing - I could go a whole lifetime without hearing another bad voice actor yelling "Oh shit, it's the cops," followed by gun shots and more shouting. On "My Hood" the beat interpolates "Rubber Band Man," one of Crunk's signature tracks and at this point it becomes clear, Young Jeezy has made a Crunk album for Crunk, About Crunk and that's what makes it sound so definitive.