MUSIC REVIEW: Y.O.D. : Space Bar

Your Old Droog is one of those emcees who though has a cadence that a Hip-Hop head can easily point out where the influences originate, like a timeline with multiple crisscrosses in support of some science fictional jargon like string theory, Droog still manages to keep it original while churning out a seemingly never-ending amount of autobiographical bars coupled with boasts not based off materialism but on life experience.

The album begins with an intro that could be attuned to something seen off a modern Star Trek series leading into the proper jump off point with “Cosmonaut” where Droog hops on a dusty instrumental and speaks on his existence of a learned everyman with the pride of someone who’s lived every word. This transitions into the standout track, “Yuri” featuring Droog absolutely smoking a dusty 80’s metal sample harder than the pulls my marijuana embracing brethren ask me for as I type this on this bus.

The next track is “White Russian”, a track where Droog uses a play on his ethnicity and stereotypes attributed to his lineage and ultimately transforms these societal constructs into a crowd rocker. It’s a repeating occurrence in Hip-Hop, a route that Ill Bill took with “White Nigger” in 2008 and Rittz took with “White Rapper” in 2014, but if it worked for them, I can see “White Russian” being in YOD’s setlist for years to come.

“Space Bar” would not be a YOD album without a nod to Kubrick’s filmography, giving way to “2001”, a record paying homage to “Space Odyssey” while Droog gets inventive by spitting couplets and punctuating every several bars with reflective soliloquies over what sounds like something the RZA had in SP1200 back in ’93. Next up is the posse cut “Meteor Man” that sounds like an audible Battle Royale. Bars like “Method acting like Dave East in the Wu-Tang series” and “Stick figure art to Rembrandt’s” would melt any other competitive emcee’s rhyme book, but as the old adage goes : real recognize real.

Lil Ugly Mane steals the show on the posse cut, killing it with existentialist knowledge and reflection layered into every word, while Billy Woods closes the track with a cadence that is reminiscent of Godemis laced with a healthy amount of five percenter science. Should the film “Meteor Man” ever be reproduced, studio executives should start here for the soundtrack tracklist. “Mojito” is a fun record as Droog plays around with innuendos (“Keep it jumping like your ho’s libido”) and Hip-Hop history (“Got loose like Madlib! With the LootPack”), leaving Nickelus F. to punctuate the deceptive party record with powerful quotables bringing the song to a close with the words : “If I can survive my past the rest is nothing”.

The last two records preview the then upcoming DumpYOD project , “The Wolf On Wall Street II”, as effective as Loud Records era DJ Paul inserting ads at the end of classic 666 records for upcoming Hypnotize Camp LPs. “Blue Hawaiian” sounds like an ALC instrumental, as YOD injecting humor in nearly every line of his verse as Tha God Fahim comes in off the tag fresh and prolific as ever stating he’s like “John Lennon while penning” and living up to every affirmation, casually exchanging bars about his lifestyle with that of a samurai training in a dojo.

The space station gets powered down with “Dom Perignon” with more affirmations ( “Got to be at least worth 100 mil. before I turn 40”) and a hook that sounds inspired like C.L. Smooth wrote it during the “T.R.O.Y.” sessions, while carrying the spirit of Kanye’s “Last Call”. Fahim lends his vocals for a few minutes, but Droog ultimately affirms his position as the star of his album not to be outshined closing with the statement “Old Droog an american institution like The Simpsons” , before the station shuts down symbolically on the outro. Providing an excellent bridge to “The Wolf On Wall Street II” and YOD’s previous solo album “Time”, Droog has stood the test of that very album’s title so why not set the bar in a place where theory of time is at it’s most relative ? Truly, the only problem with “Space Bar” is that there’s so many bars that could be labeled out of this world on this project, that it is incomprehensible as to why the “Bar” in the album title wasn’t pluralized.

A question that may forever go unanswered, given Droog’s reclusive nature that only further empowers the focus on his craft, and with art like this, some questions are best left to the ethers where Time and the Bar of Space meet.

Score : 4/5

Artist: Your Old Droog

Release date: November 29, 2021