Review: "New Beginnings" Album by Reason
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TDE essentially never misses when it comes to signing artists. Aside from the main names on the roster such as Kendrick, ScHoolboy Q, Jay Rock and Ab-Soul, Top Dawg has signed dope newer artists such as SZA, Isaiah Rashad and now Reason.
I first heard about Reason when he was featured on the Black Panther Soundtrack on a record called “Seasons”. He also re-released a 2017 project of his is 2018 titled “There You Have It” which I was a huge fan of. When he announced he was dropping his first official album with TDE, “New Beginnings”, I was extremely excited.
Being a Reason fan, I had been listening to all the singles that he’d dropped leading up to the project. The tracks “Pop Sh*t, “Show Stop”, “Flick It Up” and “Sauce” had all been released before, yet sounded even better in the context of the album. I personally was excited to hear all the non-single tracks because those typically hold deeper content (and because I’d already listened to the singles about 100 times each).
Reason displays his typical brand of rapping throughout the project which includes lyricism, wordplay, similes, punchlines and storytelling; all elements of hip-hop that have become underappreciated in today’s musical climate.
There are two songs in particular that really stood out to me: “Gossip” and “Windows Cry”. “Gossip” reminded me of the track “Cut You Off (To Grow Closer)” by Kendrick Lamar. Reason speaks on how he has people in his own family who want to see him struggle and fail. Kendrick’s third verse on “Cut You Off” speaks on how he has family members who he wants to cut off because all they do is talk about other family members behind their backs.
The outro to Reason’s album, “Windows Cry” is a very deep and introspective track where Reason is very transparent about thoughts he’s had during his time being signed to TDE. He even goes as far as speaking on being nervous about being screwed over by a label as it has happened to many others in the industry. He talks about how Kendrick is the main focus on TDE and wonders what happens if he doesn’t reach K-Dot levels. He mentions that when joining a label he essentially is joining what’s supposed to be a family, but at the same time, they’re basically strangers to him. I really respect Reason for being this open and transparent about thoughts that crossed his mind about what most would perceive as “making it”.
Overall, I felt that this was a very solid debut album and one of the better hip-hop projects of 2020. There is a solid mix of replayable/catchy type records as well as introspective records. It’s full of lyricism and musicality as well as dope features. I’m proud of Reason and I feel he has a bright future ahead of him.