Where's My Receipt? by Smart Cookie

Earlier today I purchased Jill Scott's recent release, "Collaborations". Being a huge Jill Scott fan, with no hesitation I tossed the cd into my cart. I didn't even bother to look at the tracks; Jill Scott never puts out trash...so I thought. This cd is straight garbage! I came home from a long, hectic day, expecting to chill and relax to some new mellow tracks. Instead, I sat on my couch in shock, desperately skipping the tracks to find at least one hit single. "This can't be right," I said to myself, hoping that the bonus Target cd contained a completely new set of tracks. Unfortunately, it only included the footage of the making of another wack song. The only good tracks on the cd are "Daydreaming" and "Love Rain", both old tracks that we've all heard. I hate to do this to you, Jill, but I have to give "Collaborations" a 1/2 of star out of 5, and hope that in the future, you collaborate with different producers.

After wishing that I hadn't thrown away my receipt, or even opened the cd in the first place, my mistake of a purchase was redeemed by my other instinctual buy...Mos Def's "True Magic". After what I had just went through, I was immediately weary of what I was about to hear, especially after realizing that Mos Def's cd had no type of insert, and had appeared to be made on his personal computer. However, after listening to the cd, I can say that it's truely magical revolutionary music at it's best. And, I'm sure that Mos Def intentionally understated the "image" of the cd packaging to draw attention to what's most important...the actual music. Just in the packaging, Mos Def has snidely critiqued the state of music, black culture, etc. "True Magic" is a phenomenal cd; No bells and whistles, no collabos, just straight hotness. Every track can be listened from beginning to end. And ofcourse, Mighty Mos has a few singing tracks, which are more informed and modernized versions of Umi Says. If you are into revolutionary, underground hip hop, black panther-esque, music, then by all means pick this cd up. "True Magic" is an intelligently written, positively, conscious album. Pick this one up, it offers a great start to the month of February. And I give it 5 stars and the fist, POWER TO THE PEOPLE!