BOOSIE FREE!
[Video][Website]
[5.25]
Alfred Soto: Sup, Boosie! Prison has made him reflective. Sometimes he cries and he don’t know why. He can’t help what he done. He’s still got his Chris Tucker-indebted sneer. That’s all he got.
[4]
Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: If you spend any amount of time on Twitter, Lil Boosie’s recent release from prison may have seemed like the biggest news story of the year so far. His ever-rising profile is very much the result of intense fandom and regional heroism, but no so much one that guarantees the casual rap fan will know plenty about Boosie Bad-Ass. “Show the World” functions as a pretty good way in for the Boosie-adverse fan. In the first minute, you have an assertion of Boosie’s history of making “quality street music,” a rundown of his family life and of his love towards his fans. A moment later, you know about the family members he’s lost and the reason why he stunts hard. By the third verse, long-time compadre Webbie arrives, a sign of musical family. It’s a fair entry point for those wanting to know why it matters that #BoosieFree.
[6]
Jonathan Bradley: “I just like to make people happy,” would be mealy mouthed words from near any other rapper, but in Boosie’s nasal yap they’re scuffed with an aching sincerity, and an implicit rebuke against the State of Louisiana, which, after originally incarcerating him for activity that’s probably now legal in two states of the Union, waylaid him for years on murder charges for which it couldn’t find evidence. It’s a glimpse of why this rapper has such an extraordinary following in the Deep South: he forces his words to vibrate with an uncomfortable closeness. It’s the too-close-to-the-surface intensity that made Pac an icon, and it can’t help but give his work extra dimensions. Just how much is he admitting — or demurring — with the conjunctions in, “But I’m a gangsta and I rock shows”? (Is the “but” the important part or the “and’?) “Show Tha World” has the rushed quality of a single that is not so much comeback as I’m still here, but it’s testament to Boosie’s talent that its so absorbing nevertheless. He’s better positioned than Tip or Weezy to make something of his post-prison career, anyway, and if he does, he might live up to this song’s title.
[7]
Patrick St. Michel: More a post-prison mission statement than anything else, “Show Tha World” is a nice re-introduction to Lil Boosie (and a good introduction for kids who only know him through “Free Boosie” t-shirts). It’s heartfelt (“I just like to make people happy/four kids I just like being a good daddy”) but also like a moment of sweetness after a long time away. Sounds like a prelude to bigger things to me.
[6]
Crystal Leww: Guest commentary from my brother, the first time he heard this song: “It’s like they recorded this before he went to prison, and noticed that he was off-beat and off-key so they got some lady to fix the chorus.” Look, I’m glad that Boosie’s out of prison, too, but this is just lazy mixing combined with an inability to let go of creative control.
[4]
Katherine St Asaph: Free Boosie? More like Free Mixing Job.
[3]
Brad Shoup: Good bass! Good damn bass work. For all his talk about reality rap, Boosie namechecks a bunch of his A-list peers; there’s even a sung snatch of “Good Life” at the end. Kiara’s hook can’t match his; she’s on some low-wattage R&B station thing, but with that low-end and the twinkly piano, I guess the direction makes sense. Webbie bats cleanup, and he boosts the excitement level considerably. I want to root for this more than I want to listen to it.
[6]
Scott Mildenhall: As impressed as he is at himself for singing his own hooks, it’d be better if Lil Boosie didn’t, because his voice when not rapping here is quite annoying. Fortunately there are lots of saving graces: the time Kiara is given on the hook, the piano sounding very similar to the clavioline in Del Shannon’s “Runaway”, and the barely there shimmer of strings bringing the faintest tension, subtle enough for all three voices to underline how on top of it they are.
[6]