Disco de The Game: “Documentary [Clean]”

I was first introduced to The Game on Lloyd Banks' "Hunger For More" CD on the track "When The Chips Are Down". The song was pretty good but seeing that this was the newest member of G Unit, I wanted to hear him on a few more tracks before I tried to form an opinion on his skills. However, when I heard The Game on Jim Jones' "Certified Gangsta (Remix)", then I knew that The Game had skills. On the track, The Game puts Jim Jones and Cam'ron to shame on their own track as he clearly steals the show. The Game would also be featured on Young Buck's "Straight Outta Cashville" CD on the track "Stomp" that also featured Ludacris. The track originally featured TI and Ludacris but TI decided that he didn't want to be featured on the track after the tongue lashing that he got from Ludacris. My roomate then purchased a mixtape entitled "DJ Neptune Presents The Game Westside Story". This mixed CD has alot of nice tracks and freestyles on it. The best being "Westside Story", "Get Your Money Right" featuring Jay Z and Dr. Dre", "Still Cruisin" w/Eazy E, and the whole track from the Boost Mobile commercial, "The Whole City Behind Us" featuring Kanye West and Ludacris. After listening to this mixed CD and other downloads from The Game, I was anxiously awaiting "The Documentary".

"The Documentary" definitely doesn't disappoint. On "Westside Story", The Game tries his best to give the west coast a 2004 national anthem, as he gives props to the west coast groups and artists that came out before him and how he's going to keep the west on the map for awhile. Dr. Dre clearly proves why he is still one fo the best producers today with this track. "Dreams" is produced by Kanye West and The Game does a good job mixing in the clever wordplay with Kanye's sample on the track. "Hate It Or Love It" is produced by Fat Joe's boys, Cool & Dre and features 50 Cent. This is my favorite track on the CD so far as The Game and 50 Cent use the old school sounding track and reminisce to how things were going on back in the day before they started making records and had any celebrity status. "Higher" is another Dr. Dre produced track that has The Game talking and bragging about certain topics. Although, at one time he said that he wouldn't touch Ashanti if she was butt naked and in his bed. I am not sure about you, but I find that very hard to believe. "How We Do" is the first single from "The Documentary" and this track has The Game and 50 Cent making a faster version of "In Da Club". "How We Do" will definitely have you on the dance floor even if you have 2 left feet like I do. Havoc from Mobb Deep produces "Don't Need Your Love" which features Faith Evans. This is actually one of the most serious tracks on the CD along with the Busta Rhymes featured "Like Father, Like Son". Between all the bragging and the word play it's nice just to hear a song where an artist is just reflecting and past times and speaking from life experience that don't involve what they did with females and how they were on the block all night. Timbaland shows up to produce "Put You On The Game" which has the potential to be a single later on down the road. Timbaland always knows how to produce the club banger and he does so again on this track with The Game. "Start From Scratch" features Marsha (the singer) from Floetry. The Game reflects on events that happened in his life and he is saying if he could change the way that the events happened, then he would do things differently in certain situations. "Runnin'" features G Unit's Tony Yayo and his Hi Tek on the track. The Game uses his clever wordplay and Tony Yayo puts his desert eagles on to make one of the better tracks on "The Documentary". "No More Fun And Games" is produced by Just Blaze. If this track was longer than 2 and a half minutes then this track would be my favorite track. The Game rides the sample by creating 3 nice verses. This shows that although he overuses the wordplay that The Game definitely has versatility. "We Ain't" features and is produced by Eminem. As expected, when you are featured on a track with Marshall Mathers, he is going to out do you on your own track and The Game even playfully admits that on the song's last verse. I am mad at "Where I'm From" because the original track had a verse from Dr. Dre. However, The Game and Nate Dogg still rip the track produced by Focus. "Don't Worry" might as well be a Mary J. Blige track that features The game because for the 1st minute and 15 seconds of the song the only thing that you hear are Mary's vocals. However, the Dr. Dre track makes you forget that as The Game still has nice verses on the song.

Overall, "The Documentary" gets 2005 off to a nice start as far as new releases are concerned. You will get tired of The Game droppin' verses using Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, Mase, Eazy E, Lloyd Banks, Young Buck, Snoop and other artists' names in the middle of verses but his skills will override all the negative opinions of the CD. As he says on the title track, this is his "Straight Outta Compton". After you listening to "The Documentary" then you will understand why. If The Game can stay out of trouble and concentrate on rapping and working to get even better, The Game will be around for a long time.

James' Top 5

1) Hate It Or Love It w/50 Cent

2) No More Fun And Games

3) Dreams

4) Runnin' w/Tony Yayo

5) Where I'm From w/Nate Dogg

Please tell me why anybody who was not looking forward to this CD would even review it? If you weren't looking forward to it, of course you are going to say only bad things about it. "I want some heavy metal rock." Then why the hell were you listening to "The Documentary?" You don't even have to be necesarilly looking forward to it, but at least go into it with an open minded attitude. It's stupid for people to bad mouth these albums when they know nothing about it. The Game's debut CD is awesome, and "Hate It or Love It" is incredible.

You have to appreciate the things The Game said about his past life, about how he only did what he did because it was a last resort. I give him mad respect for that, because while all of these other Ja Rule's and whoever else are out glorifying the thug life, The Game is being real: nobody wants to live that way, and if they say they do, it's just to look hard. The Game isn't putting up a front, and he's just being honest. Plus, you gotta give him some love for the line about Mariah Carey...

The Game's debut album is worth having, if for nothing else than the murderers' row of producers on it. If you are a fan of current mainstream producers, this album should be everything you would hope for. Excellent work by Dre, Kanye, Hi-Tek, and Timbaland make this probably one of the most costly albums ever made. That is not even taking into account guest spots by 50 cent (3), Nate Dogg (2), Eminem, Mary J. Blije, and Faith Evans. In my opinion the real star of this album is Just Blaze. His two tracks (Church For Thugs, and No More Fun and Games) are the albums high points, with Hi-Tek's Runnin close behind. Even the Eminem-produced We Aint is aiight. Top to bottom, this album *sounds* good both in the car and in a normal stereo.

While Game has shown his talents on several mix tapes and guest spots, The Documentary is too repetitive and unambitious. It is nice to recognize those who came before you and paved the way. However, Game's constantly repeated references to Dre (35 times), 50-Cent (17), G-Unit (10), and popular older rappers (Tupac, B.I.G., Jay-Z) are tiresome (not to mention the way he disengenuously claims a Jay-Z diss is meant for Ja Rule). At times, the Documentary seems like one long G-Unit infomercial, with rappers, sneakers and other products plugged accordingly. The downside of being able to afford top-tier guest rappers (he shares billing on 12 of the 17 tracks) is that more often then not Game is outshined by them, with the obvious exception of Tony Yayo. Game does have some clever punchlines, but he seems at times to be a caricature - you can almost picture Dre in the lab thinking, "I'll take Banks' wit, Buck's gangsta attitude, combine them and presto!" I do not mean to not give him credit: Game does have an excellent flow, rides a beat well, and can be fairly clever at times. It just seems that is album is too cynically exploitive and self-conscious (for instance the SE cover that is a rip-off of Ready to Die with a NWA chain).

In the end I give the Documentary 3.5 stars: worth listening to, but not as impressive a debut as I expected based on his earlier stuff.

This cat has no credentials. He's only been rapping three years. What?!?! Not making records for three years but RAPPING for three years.Does getting shot give you a chance at making records? This dude has no style and no flow. I grew up in the era of Kane, Rakim, NWA etc. These dudes new what puttin it down on the mic was about. Today's rappers are str8 up rediculous. No thought in the rhymes, just talking about meaningless b.s.and the sad part is people are eating it up like it's the greatest thing. Learn your history. Seriously, if your under 25, go back and check for the classics. The kind if stuff that the rappers of today are copying that the "new" fans of hip-hop have no clue about. Do you realize that no rapper from the LA area , besides Ice T, has "made it" without going through Dr. Dre in some form or fashion. The Game is a poor reflection on his judgement of talent. I could go on and on but I'll stop. THE DOCUMENTARY IS WACK!!! Str8 up!

This guy was hand picked by Dre to be the next big thing from the West? The saviour of West Coast rap? What a bunch of bull.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a hater of gangsta rap or a hater of G-Unit/Aftermath/Shady (they are running things in the game when it comes to record sales). However, when it comes to quality of music or even quality of good gangsta rap toons they are not runnin' things. This Game guys rhymes are weak, topics are weak & he's downright the biggest tryhard since Ja Rule. (Ja wanted to be pac, Game thinks he is the long lost member of NWA)

The Game is a fake, who couldn't rap if his life depended on it. So many lame metaphors based around celebrities, references to the bloods & crips, shout outs to his idols & his buddies & his ever-present references to Nike Airs & his Air Force Ones. People may not admit it, but that is all the formula for a piece of crap album (Trust me not even the beats can save these 10ish year old lyrics). On 1 song he refers to himself as Cube, Dre, Ice T & Eazy E mixed in one, which I think is an insult to all these founders of gangsta rap. On the song with Eminem he admits he was killed by Em on the track & then even uses a punchline as pathetic as saying he rides his own ****.

The Game wastes the good beats as well. (Can you imagine what a Royce Da 5' 9" or Black Thought could do with these beats?) Start from Scratch is the prime example with an incredible beat & sample from Dr Dre & the Game wasted it. The song with Mary J Blige sounded great until about a minute into the song when the game started to rap. He couldn't even get the song titled Like Father, Like Son out the right way because he used lame metaphors trying to relate his son to his shoes.

If you've heard the verse The Game does on When The Chips Are Down (Lloyd Banks - Hunger For More) & were impressed, don't buy the album. That verse is tighter than anything on this album & he only use double compound rhymes on a few songs on this album.

The album is so bad that after me & my brother heard it the first time, he even admitted that he'd rather listen to Chingy than than Game - at least Chingy aint a gang banger he said.