Ugly Duckling - Taste the Secret

Andy Cooper, Dizzy Dustin, and Young Einstein are probably gonna be stereotyped by most people as being nerds. However, if you are stupid enough to do that and write these guys off, you're gonna be missing out on some of the most refreshing Hip Hop to hit this year. Look at the quality releases this year so far, there's Murs, 50 Cent, Akrobatik, Brother Ali, Immortal Technique, Tonedeff, J-Zone, and so on, but this album definitely makes the list as the best releases.
Young Einstein is a monster on the beats. He sounds like a Just Blaze for the underground. The album starts off with "Opening Act," a track about having to open up for headliners, and how much it sucks but it's something you have to do. "Turn It Up" is another banger, which has Andy and Dizzy rhyming about loud music. These are simple concepts, but the lyrics are very entertaining and the beats are dope.
The theme of this album is the fast-food joint that serves the famous "Meat Shakes." While Prince Paul is selling whaleburgers on princepaulonline.com, These guys are selling turkey shakes. The interludes on "Taste the Secret" all revolve around the store. This is funny at first, and it stays entertaining at first, but some of the skits run too long. Lucky for them though, the songs really carry the album and make it an album you wanna keep around.
"Dumb it Down" is a great track that is so relevant to today's world. It's all about how how you shouldn't "say anything too profound, dumb it down!" It's funny actually that Prince Paul comes back to the review, because during my interview with him, he was talking about how today's artists try to come off dumber than they actually are, and back in the Stetsasonic days, everyone tried to come off smarter than they actually were. Think about the relevancy of this topic today.
"Abigail Silk" is a track about a guy who meets a girl at an ice cream truck and then can't get in touch with her, but here's where I get confused. The dude loses the number, but he walked her home, so instead of looking for her, he should just knock on the door if he really wanted to see her so bad. But if you don't overanalyze stuff, you'll probably enjoy this track.
UD goes after the wankstas on "Mr. Tough Guy." Now some people say they're doing that because they're nerds. These guys aren't rapping about how tough they are, but they have a point calling out all these so-called thugs. I mean, when I go to the local mall, it's a freak show that looks like rocking anything from hiphopjewels.com is mandatory. Next time you hit the mall, play the game "Spot the Fake Chain," and if you're not in the double-digits after an hour, than you're really not paying attention.
A topic these guys also hit on is foul language, and this definitely isn't a track I like. I couldn't care less about a topic like this, regardless of how they feel about cussing. It's fuckin cool to swear! Nah, but seriously this isn't a topic that I really care to hear about more than once on the album.
"I Wanna Go Home" is one of the hardest beats on the album, and it's something ya favorite Domino's delivery boy can relate to. You gotta check the whole album to see what goes down between the carnivores and the vegetarians. It's pretty funny how these guys took such an obscure topic and flipped it into a whole story that stays fairly entertaining.
This is an album that a lot of Heads can enjoy if they don't approach it with an overly critical mind. This is good, light-hearted party music. These guys aren't rhyming about how dope they can come on the mic, instead they're having some fun making good music. While they're not the illest lyricists, they make up for that with their creativity, like the "Meat Shake" theme and the off-beat topics they rhyme about. Check it out, I'd definitely recommend this to all heads looking for good Hip Hop.

By Brian Kayser