ShareTweet

It's been many years since we were introduced to the latest 'next big thing' as the game seems to get saturated with the same 'come and go' rappers. But back in 2003 Joe Budden was just that. Signed to Def Jam, he had a string of club bangers released and seemed to have his path all layed out and ready to walk. However the label and Budden himself had huge disagreements on the direction of which they wanted the content of the music to go. This led to the two parting ways and began Joe Budden's evolution into a real talking, hard hitting representative of the street. The link up with royce da 5'9'' and Joel Ortiz in 2009 and the resulting group 'Slaughterhouse' saw Budden once again excel and show that he now deserves to be mentioned when discussing the lyrical greats.

This mixtape is no different. The emotion expressed is really fealt throughout the whole album and his intelligent wordplay seems to have you gripped, eagerly awaiting the next punchline or verse. However, this is a mixtape and so as expected some of the production can seem a little muddy and seems to drone a little on some of the tracks, taking away, a little, from the pure, raw talent of Budden. The best tracks for me were; 'Ordinary Love Shit', 'Hate Me', 'Times are Hard' and Dear Angie. These tracks have a genuine feel to them and provoke reactions something that has been missing from Hip Hop as of late. The album is well worth a listen, 19 tracks deep and at a cost of nothing I can't see why everybody hasn't already purchased it.

Check it out here on Dat Piff...
http://www.datpiff.com/joe-budden-Enter-The-Mind-Of-Joe-Budden-mixtape.202946.html

Review written by Danny Johnson.