Kee Smith: “Bro (J. Cole Cole Summer)” totally lacks originality!
“Nothing Even Matters” is a duet performed by Lauryn Hill and D’Angelo. It’s the 12th track on Hill’s classic album “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill”. “Cole Summer”, on the other hand, is a single released by J.Cole prior to his sophomore album “Born Sinner”. The track also appeared on the J.Cole’s 2013 mixtape “Truly Yours 2”. Sampling “Nothing Even Matters”, Cole speaks on a variety of topics in a reflection of his road traveled thus far. The song culminates into a conversation between J.Cole and hip-hop personified.
Now Kee Smith proposes to take the song further down the road with yet another reworking of the track called “Bro (J. Cole Cole Summer)”. Since dropping his first mixtape in 2009, J.Cole has ushered in an era of lyrical artistry for younger fans.
While many of his colleagues are content with dropping one-dimensional club tracks, Cole paints more accurate pictures of life’s struggles. Sure, he revels in life’s joys but he also grapples with its pains.
Combine that lyricism that’s light-years ahead of his peers and they’re no reason he shouldn’t be mentioned in the same breath as rap’s elite. Kee Smith takes a cue from Cole’s example and moves in the same storytelling direction, only he is terrible in any direction he goes!
Kee Smith’s obviously not perfect (who is?) but, honestly, that’s what takes him down even below the current caricatures masquerading as rappers. He can’t even masquerade. He stands at the crossroads of what’s happening around him, and brings us along for the ride as he looks in many directions and grapples with the rights and wrongs of the soul, whether it’s his own or that of others. Problem is he is still grappling
Even when he’s drawing on his own experiences, he exercises an observational acuity that suggests how much life surveillance he’s been doing. Lyrically he tries to be a deeply skilled empathizer, but Kee Smith’s offhand, free-styling flow fails on every attempt.
On “Bro (J. Cole Cole Summer)”, the rhymes are far from tight, while the beat is obviously tight, but that’s because the beat’s not his. Which is always a bad thing to be if want to have any hope of moving ahead of the line in this game.
The moral of this story there is always someone, no matter if they’re unknown, waiting in the wings, trying to take your spot while you’re focused on anything but your hunger. The problem is Kee Smith shows us here that he cannot even rap rap comfortably over a tried and tested beat, no matter how hungry he pretends to be. The next step would be to hear him on an original, so at least he doesn’t have to be embarrassingly mentioned alongside J.Cole. However I’m afraid that that would be another 3 minutes of your time wasted on a would-be rapper that really has nowhere to go and nothing to say. He is so bad that he needs to copy other peoples song, but more than a clone he sounds like a clown!
OFFICIAL LINKS: SOUNDCLOUD – INSTAGRAM – TWITTER
