Although I quite enjoyed the first Black Eyed Peas album “Behind The Front,” I was somewhat skeptical when it came to picking up their follow-up “Bridging The Gap.” As a result of my skepticism, I more or less avoided purchasing the record for the longest time, until I eventually found a cheap copy sitting on the shelf of a second hand record store. I couldn’t tell you how much I paid for it, along with a copy of Guru’s “Jazzmatazz Volume 3,” but it was obviously right then and there that I finally decided to experience the record for myself. Mind you, both of these albums were cut-out copies. That means the label had one too many copies of either record, so they cut or drilled holes into the top right hand corner of the cover and shipped all of their excess copies to record stores all over the place just so they could sell the record at a low price…..at least I think that’s how cut-outs work. They were still brand new though. Needless to say, I found myself enjoying the record quite a bit, even though many years later, somebody else out there informed me that after their first album, it all started to go downhill. Fair enough, that’s one other man’s opinion. Music is subjective, right? We should all know that. Since that’s the case, I’m gonna give you my opinion…. let’s get into the review:
BEP Empire: For their second Interscope Records album, Black Eyed Peas present us with a somewhat playful piece, which sees them declaring their love for all things hip hop. Joining them on the track was DJ Premier of Gangstarr. Some of the lyrics in the song feature them slamming all of the negative energy which is usually displayed in other forms of rap: “Every other rapper’s talking about killing somebody but that ain’t hip hop to me,” says Will.I.Am, while Aple D Ap claims that “every other rapper is talking about high profiling but that ain’t hip hop to me.” Of course there are also disses towards other rappers. They don’t name names, but this is hip hop – dissin goes on: “Your style is dated and you ain’t came out yet, don’t think you’re fresh ‘cos you’re rockin’ them outfits.” This song was accompanied by a rather humorous video clip, which spoofed infomercials.
Weekends: All righty then…..track 2 first came to my attention while I was watching the music show “Rage” one day. For some reason I was somewhat put off by their use of the Sly Stone song “Family Affair.” I guess I was just tired of hearing samples every five seconds….but again, this is hip hop, sampling is also a part of the fun. Lyrically they’re just talking about how they like to go out every weekend….it also appears that they go out during the week as well, cause the first verse begins with Will calling Taboo on the phone to make plans for a Thursday night. Still, the party vibe is in full effect. On this cut they’re joined by a Canadian songstress called Esthero, who sings the hook from another old school classic – “Look Out Weekends” by Debbie Deb. I’d never heard of that song before, so thank you BEP crew for introducing me to some classic electro funk. “Weekends” is of course based upon that very classic. Check out the outro to this one, though, .the guitars are just beautiful. Ah, live instrumentation. The video for this one was a throw back to the whole ’80s hip hop nightlife.
Get Original: Track three features Will gettin on the mic and kickin some extremely aggressive rhymes, in which he commands a few rappers out there to “stop now, get original.” This particular hook is lifted from a reggae song called “Heads High,” which was originally performed by a Jamaican toaster called Mr Vegas – another song I was introduced to through their sampling. They certainly weren’t too impressed with the whole hip hop scene, with howling lyrics like “If you ate pebbles, yo’ shit wouldn’t rock. You one o’ them balloons made to go pop!” Hmmm…..this lyric seems somewhat ironic given their current status in the music world. We can only blame their record label for that, cause they were headed for the door after this disc came out. It was either get out or make something more accessible. Will and the crew chose to sell out. What a shame. Another rapper by the name of Chali2na joins the trio on this track. He’s from the group called Jurassic 5….or J5 for short.
Hot: All in all, this is just a party anthem, which definitely has that energetic kind of feeling to it. The lyrics are in no way thought provoking like they were on their first album, but then that wasn’t even the intention….not as far as I can tell at least. This is really just about having a good time. Some of the lyrics include: “Break hearts like Tom Petty” and “It’s so amazing even the blind be gazing.” Ummm…..okay, guys. Again, they’ve decided to collaborate with somebody who’s fairly unknown, a female songstress called Kim Hill, who also appeared on their first record. She’s no longer affiliated with the crew though. She later dissed them – and quite hard in a song of hers called “The Real Hip Hop.”
Cali To New York: I remember hearing this song years ago on a British website called “Vibin.” I’m not really paying very much attention to the lyrical content….as a matter of fact, whatever they’re saying doesn’t really make sense to me. I’m guessing that they made this song in order to signifiy some kind of unity between the two states which were once battling against one another. Also, they’re big fans of De La Soul, who appear on this track with ‘em. So….yeah, that’s my interpretation of this song, which ends with a Spanish flamenco guitar and some woman speaking that very language….don’t ask me what she’s saying though. More proof that BEP were once quite an organic group.
Lil Lil: Again this really just a song that was designed to make you get up and shake sumthin at a nightclub or what have you. They want to make us mentally naked while they take old school sound bites from 1986 and throw it into some other intergallactic place all together: another thing they were once very good at….actually, I shouldn’t say that, I’m sure they still would be capable of that…just don’t count on it now that the rec execs want that brainless pop shit from them. Again, this song concludes with some live instrumentation…just listen to that Fender Rhodes piano.
On My Own: The live instrumentation has most certainly blessed this song right here. Not only that, it’s also given it a very warm, organic type of feeling. As far as I can see, this song is really all about individuality and not allowing anybody to really change your personality. It is on this track that they’re joined by Mos Def – I totally forgot that he was even featured on this album. French speaking duo Les Nubians are also featured here. They sing the chorus in English though….that’s not to say there aren’t any French vocals on the track though, cause there are. It ends with Will (or somebody else in the group) putting his finger on some kinda headphone jack and creating a buzzing type of sound. They’ve then created a beat which mimicks this type of sound, which segues into….
Release: “Tight show tonight. Voice all scraggly.” OK, Will, whatever you say. From there, we’re treated to some incredible live drums and even more real live instruments. It even sounds like there’s a piano accordion here. Mind you, I never picked up on that before today. I guess you learn something new everyday. Going by the chorus it just sounds like they’re encouraging us to let our anger out, rather than leaving things all pent up inside. I think it’s a pretty decent song…..some folks out there may not take too much to the screaming though. For some reason, the cussin has been blanked out of my own personal copy…can’t speak for anybody else who has this album, though. Also, I should acknowledge the fact that Taboo raps in Spanish at one point. Parts of this song were also featured towards the end of the “Get Original” video. It is a nice n’ jazzy interlude which informs us all to “don’t stress yourself, breathe in, breathe out” which closes us outta this song.
Bridging The Gaps: I always thought this was a real nice and laid back title track. It features elements from the Bill Withers song “Hello Like Before” and Kim Hill’s voice gives the overall song quite an ambient type of feeling. Seems like they’re comparing their rap careers to that of a bridge. I, of course, could be wrong about that, but hey this is all just my opinion. Other than that they’re talking about how they just wanted to keep doing what they were doing at the time and that they wanted to keep spreading a whole bunch of positive vibes all around.
Go Go: In the song “Lil Lil,” they talked about taking sounds from the ’80s and thrusting them into the new millennium. Well, this song features them doing exactly that. The song in question is “Planet Rock” by Africa Bambatta and the Soulsonic Force. Mind you they also referenced Soulsonic in the first song off this very album. Overall the song has that full-on party vibe, which is quite typical of the Peas, seeing as how a lot of what they do is all about “put your hands up and have a good time.” This was one of those songs that I kept going back to when I first bought the album in around 2001 or so…or was it just 2000? I don’t quite recall.
Rap Song: Ex-Fugee Wyclef Jean drops by the studio and lends the Peas a helping hand on this next jam. He can be heard introducing himself at the beginning of the song, while strumming an acoustic guitar. As you can imagine, the song’s nice and easy, yet somewhat rough as well, especially with the turtnable scratches. According to the liner notes, they’ve sampled “I Know You Got Soul” by one of James Brown’s many one time musicians, Mr Bobby Byrd. However, I must be deaf, because I never heard this sample at all. As we all know, James was one of the most sampled artists of all time. This song is really all about some girl who reminds Will and his buddies of a classic rap song. In this case it’s “Bonita Applebum” by A Tribe Called Quest. Yet another group the Peas always looked up to while they were growing up.
Bringing It Back: Musically this song is quite enegergetic, which means it could probably hype the crowd up….whether that be at a live show or via a DJ’s set. Lyrically it’s just them saying that they’re going to bring hip hop back to its basic format where it was all about having a good time, and none of that negative stuff was going on. In a way I suppose you could say that this is a reprise of the opening song “BEP Empire” because it recycles some of the lyrics, in particular: “Hate us if you wanna, we gonna speak on it, we gonna tell the world why hip hop is haunted, money is a drug and MCs is on it.” Yeah, that’d be right.
Tell Your Mamma Come: This is another song that they referenced earlier on in the album – see Track 2 “Weekends.” Essentially they’re just telling folks to gather round and check out their show, while bringing along a whole bunch of other folks in the process. Hence, “tell your mamma come, tell your papa come, tell your brother come sister come…..” Kim Hill sang the chorus along with Will and the crew.
Request Line: Technically, this is where the Black Eyed Peas first became slightly mainstream. At least down here in Australia that was the case. I remember spotting some guy playing this song in his car as he was driving past me one day. I was somewhat shocked that somebody other than my very good self was familiar with The Peas. What’s more, I fell absolutely head over heels in love with this song when I first heard it – first of all, Because it was a collaboration with Macy Gray, one of my favourite artists at the time. Second, because Apl.D.Ap name checked D’Angelo and The Roots, along with Macy herself. Thirdly and most importantly, because Macy sings the phrase, “Last night a DJ saved my life.” For those not in the know, that is a reference to….I suppose, quite an obscure eighties hit, which I first heard when I was just a baby. And I tell ya, when I first heard her singing that, I was like “YES!!!! These guys are officially the shit.” For the second time on one of their records, Will.I.Am and his crew made my day with yet another reference to a good ole eighties classic.
The Enemy Strikes Black: What we have here is quite an ambient remix of the opening song from this very album, again with Kim Hill on backing vocals. It’s a hidden track, so you probably wouldn’t have caught it if you took the CD off after “Request Line” ended. I think it also showed up on one of the other singles from this album….it might’ve been “Weekends,” I think. Anyhow, with this particular remix, Will.I.Am had once again made my day. This time it was simply because of the fact that while he was tweaking with the song “BEP Empire,” he walked on over to his Mac, opened up the program “Simple Text,” typed the phrase “Black Eyed Peas” and got his Mac to say it right back to him. For all the non-Mac users out there, “SimpleText” is a text-to-speech program, which, I’m not gonna lie, I’ve always been fascinated with. Even when I was a little kid I loved it. They didn’t call it “Simple Text” back then, but still, Text-to-speech is a big reason why, to this day I prefer a Mac over a PC. Nowadays Text-to-speech can also be used in TextEdit, which, by the way is the program that I used to type this review. Regardless, it’s a great way to end the album.
Verdict: Although the songs on this album didn’t feature any social commentary, every single one of them were still somewhat solid efforts. I always thought this was a pretty decent follow-up to “Behind The Front” and I still feel the same way nine years later. I’m sure all the new fans out there will hear this album and notice that it’s “different.” Well DUH of course it is. That’s a no brainer. Whether or not they choose to like it is up to them and ultimately their business. However, I personally, wish “The BEP Crew” would do stuff like this all over again while including social commentary at the same time. Then again I’d only be sounding too much like a disgruntled Prince fan wishing that he’d go back to his “Purple Rain” and “Sign O The Times” days. At least now I know how those guys feel. The Black Eyed Peas just ain’t what they used to be. It pains me to say that, but it’s true – their new album “The E.N.D.” is absolutely atrocious! Oh well, at least I still have albums like this one to reminsce over.
