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Tall tales, the Wild West is renowned for them; Pecos Bill, John Henry, and now Crook County has its shot.

As told by some wild-eyed, spaced out looking local, The Dirtball. A third installment in the rap career for our bald-headed buddy, this one surely displays how he as an artist can grow. Hitting the booth once again with Mike Kumagai, Daddy X, himself, and P-nice on the production DB just takes his “swing batter-batter” instinct and swings for the fences slapping your nugget from the top of your body like a tee-ball setup.

The DB is a percussion rapper for sure. The way he flows for days about anything is on a level compared to Tech N9ne, Twista, and BTNH. He’s been showing us since when he dropped “Poppa Dball” first emerging on Suburban Noize. In this one though I feel he reaches more into himself and pulls out linguistic flows that he rips the mic down piece by piece on. I’m not saying his first two solo albums were bad I’m just saying that they kind of sounded like they had both been recorded almost in the same session with the only direction to mold and shape an upcoming artist. Now that they process of shaping and shifting is over with we are left in the wake of “Dropping Bombs” to hear what makes the mind of the Dirtball tick.

Naming the album after his hometown “Crook County” I feel he’s trying to show us that no matter what part of it, no matter how far up or down the coast, The West Coast can still make the water bubble and the earthquake. I like the way the Subnoize Camp approached this project to hype it up. First off they did the Crook County Chronicles, an Internet program ran and operated by the raptillion himself about what it’s like day by day in Crook County. Episode 5, I think, is the one in which they even premiered a video from the album featuring two songs. Well kind of. The main focus is for the track ‘Mushroom Cloud’ in which DB shows us a piece of his psychedelic side with his mushroom tea. Then after his two verses, just when the third should kick off, it jumps into a new snippet for the opening verse to the song ‘Moonshine Rhyme’. The reason why I liked this so much was because you’re not only hearing something from the album before its release you also get a visual which is pretty silly.

Aside from rapping on subjects like taking a “trip”, and working in the garden of the dead, he also gets into what It’s like for his relationship with his woman while he’s constantly on the road in ‘Just a Friend’ ft. Lady Love. Yea, artists make tracks like this all the time, but it’s pretty cool to hear how the Dirtball can throw the words together for his version of this type of track. Like I said though he’s got a track on here called ‘Mora Kyrkogarden’ and it’s Swedish for something, something that I don’t know.

From the lyrics in the song though it sounds pretty sinister and a dark place to be, somewhere fun for any horrorcore fan to take the wife and kids. My favorite track off this project however, is ‘Speak’. I like it so much because the beat is almost an acapella, and he also released this in the Crook County Chronicles as well.

The Guest spots on this CD are indifferent. Some you can already assume would be on there; Big B, Daddy X, and Johnny Richter. Along with them though is Boondox from Psychopathic Records and CeeKay of La Coka Nostra. All the tracks with the featured artists are that much better with the extra hand lent into the melting pot of ideas used in this production. I’m not saying that the rest of the CD with DB by himself isn’t as good, it’s just fun to hear what other people think of on certain beats and subjects of songs.

The Dirtball has come a long way of running with the boys of Chola, to reppin’ the spade for Suburban Noize Records. He’s establishing/ed himself as an independent artist as well as half of the group Subnoize Souljahs. He can step on stage and captivate the crowd, he can get in the booth and mesmerize the listener, and being along side some of the best on the underground scene he’s learning how to work the business side of touring as well, I could imagine.

The Bottom Line: Get up, get one and peep it out. The Raptillion seems he’s here to stay.

Tracklisting

01. Intro
02. I’m Not
03. Mushroom Cloud – (featuring Daddy X)
04. Speak
05. All In – (featuring Big B)
06. Phantom Power
07. Taxman
08. Pitspit
09. Nightshade – (featuring Ceekay)
10. Campfire 1
11. Crook County Killaz
12. Campfire 2
13. Moonshine Rhyme
14. Tried Trued + Tested – (featuring Boondox)
15. Underground Biz
16. Just a Friend – (featuring Lady Love)
17. Grind – (featuring J. Richter)
18. Mora Kyrkogarden
19. Outro

Websites

MySpace.com/TheDirtball
SuburbanNoizeRecords.com

Record Label:

• Suburban Noize Records

Release Date:

• 03/05/2008

Reviewer:

• Whipstick