Boldy James & Conductor Williams “Across the Tracks”: All 10 tracks ranked

Boldy and Conductor slows things down a bit here, as the Detroit MC looks back on his journey from trapper to rapper. He spits, “Captor, all the sales I made/ Now I'm coming out of a UFO, lookin' like I got abducted/ If we fall, one of us should be each other's crutch/ I'm no longer running from the police, blocking the justice/ Flock in the 1017s like I'm Wooh da Kid/ Now that Rolls parked in the trap just to shoot a video.” Bold references Jay-Z's lyrics a lot in his raps, maybe Jigga should really consider doing a track with him. We would have a lot of play in a song from these two.

This outro sounds triumphant – like Boldy and the Conductor taking a victory lap. But James still needs time to think.

This set of bars stood out to me as he makes another Jay-Z reference: “It's the charm of the game that's tainted by evil/ I had to reroute the paper, I never had a paper route/ Changin' out in the County, it was Yeah, I sold drugs, but I'm not ashamed of it/ I made it out unscathed, Blocks so high you could sunbathe/ Neighborhood full of cul-de-sacs and one-ways/ Made man, ain't no more hustle' on Sundays.

He ends his verse with “I had to fall back, see everything fall into place/Counting all this paper, if I get grabbed, I know he won't wait” and the conductor throws in a sample of Wild style because the art of rhyming is ultimately a pillar of hip-hop.

This track is another family affair. Mafia Double Dee is Boldy's sister and has appeared on his songs before. Her verse on Rome Streetz's “Stunna” is my favorite line, so far. “Talkin' game time/Like Stephen A. and Skip, we ain't on the same time” and “hit the lil' b—h, made him look like his puppy died/My pockets C-walkin” , peace in mixing blood/ Known for breaking up couples, all evil b—hes love Double” are some of her standout lines in this joint. Besides the bars, Dee and Boldy have so much chemistry in the songs.

Boldy and Conductor smooth things up a bit with this track as James reminisces about his imprisonment. “I'm playing chess in the unit, me and the old school/ I'm out, I don't have my name but my legal pay/ I think about this every blue moon to keep me free,” he said. revokes. The second verse is handled by Boldy's son Bo Jack — and, to no one's surprise, the kid steps in. (I don't play),” he confidently raps.

I love how Boldy refuses to let this beat breathe at all. He gets right into it, like he's still in the same zone he was on the previous song, “The Ol Switcharoo.” While this track has a more restrained sound, the production on “Undisputed” is more deliberately frantic. It feels like a mixtape track in a good way, almost like Nas”Blaze a 50.” This song wandered around the mixtapes before finding a home Lost Tapes.

Virgil would be proud that Boldi named a song after one of his products. In a profile with the Detroit Metro Times, the Detroit rapper revealed the fashion designer wanted to remix Nike Bo Jackson crosstrainers for Boldy before she died. I'm sure Virgil was a fan, because of lines like, “To be or not to be, crime school, and majored in philosophy/Proctor drum band, made doctors in criminology” and “I made a mountain out of a baby, I'm the real MacGyver/ Turn your block into roadkill, ambitions as a grinder/ Hook, line, sinker, trap its keeper like a bookbinder.' Every bar, combined with Conductor's production, makes this track perfect for rippin' and runnin'. The beat sounds like the tires of a muscle car hitting hot pavement during a breakaway. Boldi could write a Tarantino movie.

These guys are good. There are days like today when I consider Boldy James to be one of the best rappers alive.

The hook says it all: “Tight rope in the streets, this is deadly/ When your men the witness in your case testify/ Whip my last 90 rounds with a wire hanger/ Walking through them firebreaks like a lion tamer/ Feel like a Green Bay fan for the greenbacks/ I put that dime on your head like a cheese hat/ Two and one hot, Fina slid the machine back/ My young man catches bodies like a flying table.”

Boldy gets it right here. There are so many bars here that they make you jump out of your skin. When he spits, “They learned to always be the message I bring/ I pulled the sword from the stone, some will never be king,” it gave me visions of the Disney classic The sword in the stone. Then he gives us an AZ report and pulls the competition street cards, rapping, “I could never compete, they know the flow is rather unique/I kept the proof, most of it was never street.”

Then he ends the first verse with these beautiful bars: “Stormin' on the dice, full force, I'm like a tidal wave/Owe auntie my Adrien for me shorting out her microwave/227-50-Z, n—s you know we're thick as thieves/Real streets, we never drilled, we never bit the cheese.' Boldy makes it all sound so easy and it sounds even more effortless when he's rapping over a heavy beat like the one the maestro is cooking up here. When you dream of a Boldy James and Conductor Williams tape, this is the sound you expect.

This is one of my favorite beats on the entire tape. I think he's the star of the show. I can't make out the sample, but the loop and horn sound like you're listening to it on tape on a yellow Sony Walkman. Boldi throws jewels in a way only he can, with wisdom and boldness. You can hear it when he asks the question, “Why would I take $500,000 to have dinner with Hov?/If I could pay Jay half a million to sit down with Emory Jones.” Emory is a close friend of Jay-Z, who served 16 years in prison on his back and in return was rewarded with a top-level position in Jay's ranks once he returned home.

Boldy then ends the second verse with this vivid image: “This game is cold, but I still got that chill in my bones/ “Before I could check into my room and book my ticket home me/ left another half a kilometer” hidden in memory foam/ Different print bully, don't compare me to a dog/ They say his jewels VVS but his character flawed.”

As Boldy tends to ask, what else?

This is the song that got me excited when I first gave this tape a spin. The maestro's beat transports you to a world of mystery, while Boldy gives us another exercise in elite wordplay. He raps like Michael Corleone if it was his favorite album Reasonable doubt. “Paint his frame, I'm a real artist/ All my life I've been a drill sergeant/ Trying to oversaturate the pill market,” is the stuff of beautiful evil. There are too many lines in this one to point out, but you just know that Boldy is having an out-of-body experience during the second half of this barfest. These hookless songs from Boldy are usually some of his best. Put “The Ol Switcharoo” next to songs like “Speed ​​Demon Freestyle” and “First 48 free.”