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When it's good, it's really good. Otherwise, it's never really bad, just excessive and somewhat unfocused.
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At 19 tracks, LAX is bloated and uneven, more often than not marked by weak beats and uninspired appearances. The Game’s skill and wit alone save this from being a complete disaster.
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LAX is an intense and remarkably focused record - almost every syllable concerns Compton, gangsta rap and (as one song title has it) Game's Pain - but the minor-key, would-be emotive beats of tracks such as Money or the Kanye West-produced Angel (featuring rapper Common) don't bring the best out of his expressive flow.
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Problem is, much of this record is just Game keeping up with the Joneses: everything you'd expect from a 2008 rap album is here (Lil' Wayne guest spot; boring, '80s-styled Kanye track), and the stuff that makes him unique seems harder than ever to get at.
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The Game has always borrowed from the greats. Here, he cannibalizes his own tired shtick so extensively, he lapses even further into self-parody.
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Somehow, the Game is still coasting on wispy, West Coast–nostalgia fumes--chronic, red rags, lolos, etc.--but the goodwill, at this point, has pretty much exhausted itself.
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Bad-boy rapper fails to raise his, er, game. There is something peculiarly insecure about The Game (AKA Jayceon Terrell Taylor).
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Almost everything here, from the boasting ('Money') to the baiting ('LAX Files,' 'Cali Sunshine'), is pro forma. Worse, the Game, never a fluid rapper, sounds positively lumpy, as if he were delivering verses while running up a steep flight of stairs, or as if the last few years of pugnacity have finally left him winded.
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LAX spins beautifully at first, but, like a '64 Chevy with chrome rims that hasn't paid a visit to the mechanic in 20 years, it doesn't take long before the wheels come off entirely.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 53 out of 67
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Mixed: 10 out of 67
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Negative: 4 out of 67
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Apr 22, 2015
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Feb 4, 2012
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BeauG.Sep 19, 2008There are alot of hatters out there. game does a solid job on this album. I haven't taken LAX out of the cd deck in my car for 5 days now.