Da Ol' Jersey Bastard [PA]

The odd thing about Da Ol' Jersey Bastard is that it was, in fact, Tame One's 2006 cult classic Spazzmatic -- not this one -- that sounded most like an Ol' Dirty Bastard tribute album, with Tame in a drugged-out manic haze delivering lyrically dexterous "'new-millennium new-millennium' Dirty" gem after gem. Perhaps the more keen take on this recording is that it isn't necessarily the album Ol' Dirty would make, but the album he would have in the heaviest of rotations. Xing N Fox provide a slate of expertly crafted, soul-laced beats loaded with groove, which Tame inhabits with his patented stream-of-consciousness, raw comic lyrics that few fellow MCs can compete with. The marriage produces some of the best hip-hop songs of the year, like "Action Word" and "Haha Da Rah Rah," where Tame teams with Sean Price to annihilate the mike. And, alas, Tame bookends the album with grainy audio from Ol' Dirty, spilling his typically zany, drunken maxims -- the stuff his legend was made of, the stuff that made him the worthy recipient of as many tributes as his peers and admirers see fit to make. ~ Vincent Thomas