Richer Than I Ever Been - Rick Ross
Intro:
Rick Ross is a certified Hip-Hop veteran. It’s easy for some to forget how much the Florida-native has contributed to the genre. This new album, Richer Than I Ever Been, is his 11th official studio album. At this point in his career, he has nothing else to prove despite continuing to actively release music. Let’s see what his latest contribution is sounding like.
Strengths:
The signature deep & husky voice of Ross is always gonna be the best element of his rapping. He can either sound incredibly smooth or loud & boisterous depending on the song. I’ve also noticed how exceptional he is at saying his lyrics clearly, despite having a deep voice. His flows on this album are smooth & steady. He doesn’t do too much with them & always sounds like himself (even on more modern beats like “Can’t Be Broken”).
His rapping ability itself is greatly underrated, as he’s amazing at painting vivid pictures & putting listeners in a specific setting/feeling. As usual, this album has tons of raps about his luxury lifestyle, money & business topics. There are some introspective moments & a lot of good advice being dropped, along with some very smooth talk about women.
It’s nice seeing Ross work with newer acts such as Blxst, Youngeen Ace & Benny the Butcher. Almost every feature on the album does great. 21 Savage tries something different & surprising fits well on their collab “Outlawz”. Most of the beats on the album are stellar which we're used to from Ross albums. The 808s on certain beats blend nicely with the different samples & live instruments. His voice meshes very well over horn/string/brass instruments (Ex: Rapper Estates or Imperial High).
Weaknesses:
There aren’t too many bad things I can say about this album. It’s still not his best, but it’s pretty solid for the most part. If there’s one thing I can start off saying though, it’s that the production is slightly disappointing when compared to other albums. Rick Ross is known for his beat selection & most of the beats here are fine. I specifically think of a song like “The Pulitzer” where the beat is fire, but the loop gets stale/boring after a while.
The only song I truly have issues with however is “Wiggle”. I’m not a fan of this song’s chorus at all as it’s repetitive & generic. The way he’s delivering it is almost comical especially towards the end. I also didn’t care for Future’s fit on the song “Warm Words In A Cold World”. It’s not necessarily a bad verse but isn’t even comparable to Ross’ or Wale’s. I also think “Can’t Be Broken” sounds way more like Youngeen Ace’s song than Rick Ross’.
Overall:
I believe Richer Than I Ever Been is a good album overall. It’s another solid effort from a rapper that deserves a lot more praise than he receives. This album probably won’t win over those that don’t like his style, but any Rick Ross fan will definitely enjoy a majority of this new album. Hopefully, we get a few more before he inevitably retires one day. Thank you all for reading and be sure to listen to Rick Ross’ new album with the link below.
