Cheno Lyfe “Home”
Cheno Lyfe “Home”
Released: 2009
Reviewed By: E Pluribus Unum
Committee Rating: 3.65 (of 5)
[xrr rating=3.65/5]
Cheno Lyfe brought us Home on this one. This album has all of the components you look for in a project. Fast songs, slow songs, and even a song for the ladies (#9-“Beautiful”) are available for your listening pleasure, which makes the album pretty cool. The album starts off with a charged intro where Cheno Lyfe is rapping pretty fast. He doesn’t pronounce some of his words well, but the flow eventually evens out. The album has a different overall style than this song presents, so it’s not really a good introduction to the album. I’m glad he slowed the flow down, because the fast flow wasn’t really clear cut and didn’t seem to fit him. My overall take on the album is that it’s not bad, but it’s not great either. Cheno Lyfe stays in the pocket on this one, but never gave me that long bomb down the field to catch and run with. He gains a lot of yards on “Gotta Be Me” (#3), “Beautiful” (#9) and “Touch the Sky” (#10). I even have a love/hate relationship going on with “White Rag” (#13). Why? Have you ever listened to a song that’s corny and catchy? That’s why. I can’t help but sing it. The message is great, and the song is pretty diverse. Matter of fact, I’ve probably listened to that song more than anything else on the CD, but don’t tell anybody. OK, in all seriousness, I guess I should just call it a good song, but that’s no fun. All I’m saying is this is not the type of song you would play when you’re rolling with the guys. The style of this album is pretty interesting. It’s a rap style mixed with a lot of sounds normally heard in techno music. Not a bad mixture. But, while I’m talking about sounds I have to bring this out. Somebody in Cheno Lyfe’s camp loves arpeggio mode. Cool sound, but definitely used too much for one CD. If you don’t know what I mean when I say arpeggio mode, listen to the title track and take note of the light fluttery sound in the background of almost the entire track. This sound – and different variations of this sound – are heard throughout the entire album. In other words, I heard it way more than I wanted to. Cheno Lyfe definitely steps out of the safety box on “Eyes Fixed.” I love the intro to the song and the addition of the guitar. The style is slow rock, mixed with worship, with him rapping for the verses of course. I appreciate the message, but it just didn’t fit in well with the rest of the album. This was the last song on the album and not the best time to try something totally different. The first and last song of the album stick out, instead of begin and conclude a common theme. Lyrically, Cheno Lyfe stays safe in the pocket. There’s nothing within the lyrics that really blew me away, but he doesn’t drop the ball and that counts for something. The content is pretty solid. He didn’t say anything that annoyed me or made me want to throw something. That’s a good thing, because I can be pretty picky when it comes to content. I had a raised eyebrow during “Let’s Take ‘Em to Church” but it was a false alarm. The CD has a pretty consistent flow. “Let’s Take ‘Em to Church” is the biggest shift in style or tempo outside of “Eyes Fixed” and this isn’t a bad thing. All things considered, Home is a project that takes it down the field, but doesn’t quite take it to the house. Good, but not great. But, everybody’s a critic. I’m just the one who wrote the review. Peace and much love…
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Review Committee
Review by: E Pluribus Unum
Rated by:
E Pluribus Unum – Avg Rating: 3.15
APX – Avg Rating: 4.4
DJ Guardian – Avg Rating: 3.4
