The joint 'What If' with Nas is made in the form of an enumeration - in the right hands, the scheme is almost a win-win, but only here Jade was outplayed by Nas on his field. Let Young Jeezy with a southern beat or Pharrell with his patented ugliness get into it, the sound of the album is not set by them, but by such tracks as the already mentioned 'Can't Stop Me', 'One More Step', 'Things I've Been Through', 'Come And Get Me', 'Cartel Gathering'. The general mood is sustained: this is New York and this is the street.

Album DescriptionThere is no need to be afraid - the desire to show different sides of your creativity did not turn the album into a stylistic vinaigrette. See More Your browser does not support the audio element. Provided you can stomach the Will Smith version of Cassius Clay proclaiming 'The champ is here!' about every 30 seconds (Jada's cackle could've been kept in check a little more, too), you should find that it's actually superior to this fine record. For further proof, listeners looking to go deeper are strongly advised to seek out The Champ Is Here, a teaser mix presented by Big Mike and Green Lantern. No matter the number of bright moments, you can't help but feel that Jadakiss has his best days ahead of him. These issues aside, Jadakiss makes good on his promise to become a rounded lyricist and receives some valuable help in the form of tight production work from a handful of pros - surprisingly enough, Swizz Beatz's work on 'Real Hip Hop' tops anything that producer did for Cassidy's debut, and the Red Spyda-manned title track (bizarrely tucked near the end) is Jadakiss' most vicious track yet. This, along with a particularly ill-suited 'soft and smooth track for the ladies' featuring a carted-in Mariah Carey as well as a too-familiar-sounding Scott Storch production, is thankfully the only outright blights on an otherwise satisfactory showing. The most startling thing about Kiss of Death is that Jadakiss dumped a bunch of Neptunes productions and kept only 'Hot Sauce to Go,' one of the record's poorest tracks.

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