Plenty of rappers extol the pleasures and bemoan
the pain of selling cocaine, but few rappers exude Young Jeezy's childlike joy.
For a rapper whose mascot is an angry snowman, Atlanta superstar Jeezy is
almost comically exuberant about every facet of peddling narcotics. He's gotten
far on enthusiasm alone: His subject matter is relentlessly monomaniacal,
seldom straying from the fundamentals of selling cocaine and bragging about the
neat stuff he bought with the proceeds. Jeezy should have worn out his welcome
a long time ago, but he's learned to make a little go a very long way.
His third solo album, The Recession, picks up where his
previous discs left off, with Jeezy rapping over big, dramatic synthesizer
beats and acting as his own endlessly supportive hypeman. Jeezy double-tracks
ad-libs and hyper-caffeinated overdubs so he can laugh at his own punchlines,
cheer himself on, and act altogether impressed with metaphors like "Like a
crippled mayne / you can catch me with that 'caine." Yes, Jeezy is his own
biggest fan, but his outsized swagger is addictive. He's found a style that
works, and he's riding it as far as it'll go. The few curveballs come from
guests: Kanye West gets crazy with the Auto-Tune crooning on "Put On" (et tu,
Kanyeezy?), and Nas shows up to propose putting Barack Obama on the $5,000 bill
on the uncharacteristically political "My President." Recession is silly, repetitive, and
wildly unoriginal. Yet thanks to Jeezy's razor-blade rasp and goofy charisma,
it's also strangely infectious.