Though last years SFTSAFTM was blighted by industry predation, the voice of Brooklyns Pop Smoke still cut through: no amount of radio-ready glitz could dampen the authenticity of Got It on Me, 44 Bulldog, or Gangstas. Regrettably, its successor, Faith, manages to suppress its figurehead almost entirely. Smoke is no longer the thunderous cloud descending on his anthems; rather, he feels almost entirely an afterthought. The elephant in the room is, of course, the unsolicited changes made to Faiths tracklist. Many of Smokes closest collaborators have already lamented being cut from the album -- and with fan favourite leaks manifesting here in hollow forms, their claims hold weight. The most painful loss is Eli Fross Top Shotta: originally a gravelly track firmly in Smokes ballpark, it has since been gutted of both its drill roots and its collaborator, replaced posthumously by a garishly tropical beat and the seemingly-fabricated TRAVI. A chain of similarly bankrupt decisions -- 13 of the albums tracks are alleged to feature major posthumous tampering -- ensure that Faith feels far from a testament to its creator. With Smokes collaborators cut out of the process, it would be fair to assume that his current creative team would surpass their work. Yet Faith is tarnished by a rocky production suite: Bout a Million adopts the sleepy guitar loops of the zeitgeist, 8-Ball is a farmyard-ready catatrophe, and YozBeats fiery production for Tiger has been removed entirely on Woo Baby Interlude. Amid the sea of names, a few new collaborators make waves -- Takeoff and Rick Ross proving potent partners on the nocturnal Whats Crackin and victory-lap Manslaughter -- while Smokes contemporaries (Rah Swish, Bizzy Banks, Lil Tjay) deliver some of the albums few true gems. But for the most part, features fumble more than they flourish: Pusha T plays walking billboard across multiple tracks, Kid Cudi buzzes through 8-Ball in monotone, and Kanye arrives briefly for a garbled string of syllables. Even Dua Lipa, ostensibly at home on the slick grooves of Demeanor, stumbles out with the excruciating you cant say Pop without Smoke/So fill up your lungs, my diamonds will make you choke. Unfortunately, the rappers second posthumous release is all pop, no smoke: with friends and collaborators surgically removed, Faith is littered with jarring voices, avaricious creative decisions, and a fundamental side-lining of its visionary figurehead. ~ David Crone

Rovi