Russ is a rapper out of New Jersey who’s one of the new age rappers that combines singing with his rapping. His first album “There’s Really a Wolf” received mixed reception from his audience. “Zoo” is Russ’s second attempt to grab more people’s attention and to become one of the most popular artists out there. Does “Zoo” succeed or is it a failed attempt?
The broad answer is no; it does not succeed, but it does have some of the dopest production of this year.
The album starts off with “The Flute Song” which is a great opener to the album. The beat really captures the jungle theme of the album. Russ’s lyrics, however, are subpar at best with Russ talking about his haters, money, fame, etc. Russ could have at least added some substance to this track but the beat just carries him.
“Outlaw” has a decent beat with a horrible performance from Russ. This time he tried to mix his singing and rapping together which just sounds annoying. He also doesn’t switch up his topics, instead borrowing ideas from before and talking about his riches.
Russ then decides to slow things down with “Kill Them All”, a surprisingly good track and one of the best songs on the album. Russ also produced this track: he does a job mixing in the piano with the boom-bap beat. Russ also rode the beat well on this track with him talking about these “trash rappers”.
“Missin’ You Crazy” is an attempt by Russ to make a love song and it fails tremendously. The beat is really good, with mellow snares and guitar in the background. But Russ just does not match with the beat. He could have also added a singer to this song so there could at least be a balance on this song.
“Last Forever” is a decent song that features Rick Ross and Snoop Dogg. Russ sounds good over this song, doing a verse and the song’s hook and his singing meshes well with the song. Rick Ross delivers an average verse about his lavish life and how he can please a girl with his riches.
Snoop Dogg, on the other hand, talked about his faith, the rap game and his riches as well as his more wholesome side. Russ’s verse is decent at best with him talking about his rise to success and where he is now, as he considers himself more successful than others.
Overall this album just would’ve been better if it had been another artist with Russ just producing the beats. His production skills are on point and he could have a better career with producing. However, his material and themes on this album just don’t work and he just rapped about his normal life. Russ should just stick to producing because his rapping just doesn’t mesh well at all. 1.5/5
