Beanie Sigel

“You ain’t ready for me,” Beanie Sigel chants on one of the first tracks of his fourth and newest studio album, “The Solution.” And even though Sigel has been around for over a decade, we may not ever be ready for him.

Sigel, who repeatedly touts himself as an “ignorant nigga,” doesn’t subscribe to the rap legacy of say, his long time friend Jay-Z, who intricately combines intelligent metaphors with impeccable flow. Beanie opts instead for hard-hitting, realistic lyrics with a pretty flat delivery that, at its best, sounds like Hova’s more mediocre stuff. At its worst, Beanie’s flow doesn’t even go with the beat.

The Philadelphia-based rapper seems to be cursed with the inability to make a good album. On mix tapes and guest verses, Beanie Sigel shines, but it would seem he can’t replicate these performances on the larger canvas of an LP. “The Solution” is no different; on it, Beanie struggles with his past, his faith, and—more relevant to the listener—maintaining any semblance of continuity and quality.

“I’m In” is a perfect example of all of the above. It comes roughly halfway through the record, whose trajectory resembles an inverted bell curve. The song begins with something of a cute story, where Beanie slyly picks up a girl at the mall by getting her to try on something at Cavalli, ostensibly for another woman, then buys it for her. The honeyed tale goes on after the chorus with Beanie reporting how he “fucked a bitch about six times.” What a sweetheart.

The struggle with his past seems to be an ongoing one. All but the last three tracks flaunt Beanie’s traditional themes: drinking, drugging, and killing. The first of the closing trio, “Rain (Bridge)” is the best song on the album, with Beanie trying to encourage a friend suffering hardships in prison. “Dear Self” goes on to paint a very different picture of the apparently religious artist: it sees Beanie confronting himself about his misdeeds over what sounds like a poorly-sampled segment of James Blunt’s “No Bravery.” The last song, “Prayer” continues on this short but depressing tangent, with the penitent Beans “Wondering if that’s a sign of how I’m moving through life / A reckless abandonment / A[n] accident waitin’ to happen.”

Other noteworthy tracks are the album’s first single, “All of the Above” (featuring R. Kelly), “Bout That,” and finally “Judgment Day,” which features a sample of Ozzy Osbourne’s “War Pigs” in the background. The album features a wide array of artists—some not really heard from since before Sigel’s last stint in jail, when his crew dubbed “State Property” dispersed.

Yet all the guest spots in the world couldn’t help the sheer disorganization and generally uninspired feel of the album. As Sigel explains on “Hustlas, Haze and Highways,” “Lookin’ for a nigga like Sig’ / Won’t find ‘em / I’m a dinosaur.” And like those prehistoric beasts, Beanie proves that he lacks the intelligence and refinement to compete with many of his contemporaries, or even to make just one solid, cohesive record.

—Reviewer Joshua J. Kearney can be reached at kearney@fas.harvard.edu.