R&B Radar: V-12 - Think Of You

Okay, here's something that all the thirsty QB heads should be adequately enthused about. An R&B album!! LOL, did my sarcasm fly right over everyone's head? Lemme explain. Here we have Resident Queensbridge R&B crooner V-12's newest album "Think Of You" and in true form V delivers a good product, one that even the hardcore crowd in QB, a place that has a knack for producing the edgiest Hip-Hop acts like Mobb deep, Littles, Tragedy and Infamous Mobb, not powerful singers like V-12. It's twice as ironic then that V has collaborated wth just about everyone I just named.

Along with Tony Sunshine, I would have to give V-12 the nod as having been one of the superior R&B/Hip-Hop singer's in the game for a number of years. The main difference between him and Sunshine though is that he continues to hold it down for the streets while Sunshine has sold out indefinitely. Yes, that song and video with Lumidee counts as selling out muthafucka. That being said when Sunshine finally drops that solo debut I will be one of the first, former TS fans in line to grab it and see just what the hell I've been waiting for these past 8 or so years. I digress.....If you like Jahiem and could possibly imagine him not singing so much about bullshit women and whatnot, than I would say V-12 might be someone to check for, if you haven't already. I view Jahiem's style of vocalization as being very close to V's; ripe with real talent, soulful, rich, no annoying whining and definitely sounding like it stems from many years of practice in a church choir.

"Think Of You" tries mightily to keep pace with what V-12 has been about his whole career thus far. Things like his always keen vocal work and a few bursts of production dazzlement will coerce most casual fans of the art of downbeat spirits (R&B, lol) that it's a pretty sustainable effort. As someone that can deliver a rawer message as well as swoon the ladies, "Think Of You" is a novel view into V-12's diverse capabilities and a R&B sub-genre that I wish was still around. In a lot of ways this album displays the best qualities of what many Hip-Hop and R&B scribes dubbed "Street Soul" many years ago. Not to be confused with the trendier "Neo-Soul", but containing some of the same traits, Street Soul was on the verge of emerging many times, but somehow it was and continues to be nudged out of it's momentum. Primarily due to the rapid un-raveling and quasi-transformation of the R&B sound into the favorite corporate medium for many rapper's sonic direction...long story short things got muddled, cash became king, real artist's got terribly dashed and now rappers are perpetrating to be singers themselves via autotune....but once again I digress.....

The only shortcomings that really glare out to me are V's penchant for recycling tired and extremly cliche theme's. Oh look everybody, an R&B album with songs titled "Makin Love", "Your Body" and "Thinkin Of You" on it, now that's innovative...lol. In any case, I think that V's talent mask's the fact that the actual substance of this album is very sketchy. His output is less about substance than it is about actual music however. Lemme explain. See, Most of the time you'll be too busy nodding your head along with the pulsating beats or singing along with V's ardent timbre to notice that quite a bit of this LP is somewhat un-creative as far as the song writing goes. Now that formula doesn't sound familiar does it? LOL, a good joint for getting acquainted with V-12 the entity, but not even close to his best stuff artistically in my opinion. For that you'll have to do the diligence on his guest spots on other artist's mixtape's and album's. Still, I'd be lying if I said he didn't capture a somewhat fair amount of the tonal magic from past works here. After all the man can sing. Give it a shot if you like your R&B rugged or light, but all John Legend fans beware, V-12's song composition isn't there yet, don't expect that from "Think Of You".

-BIG D O




01. Your Body
02. Think Of U
03. Makin Love
04. Off & On
05. Ok
06. Hold Me Down
07. Sideways (Feat. Fashion The Don)
08. Let Out Tha Beast
09. Over Stand (Feat. Godfather Pt.3)
10. Hate On V

http://rapidshare.com/files/158012646/V12-TOU.rar