tate Property isn’t the smartest group in the game, I guess. Not because they changed the name of their movie from Get Down or Lay Down to the name of their group, even though that is definitely slightly odd. Actually, it’s mainly because they advertise the soundtrack as an EP, even though it clocks in at a respectable 54 minutes and 13 seconds. Not that this has anything to do with the quality of the album, it’s just weird.


The State Property soundtrack is, unfortunately, pretty inconsistent. The group itself is made up of Rocafella’s First Lieutenant, Beanie Sigel, Sigel’s protégé, Freeway, and two duos, Chris & Neef who are known as the Young Guns and O & Sparks. Out of all of them, only Sigel has put out an album, and he’s actually put out two critically acclaimed albums, the Reason and the Truth. The group definitely needs to learn a little something about putting together an album, because this isn’t the best effort they could have put together. Yeah, it’s pretty decent for a soundtrack, but that might be because most of them suck. The Training Day OST was full of great songs, but the last half of the album was pointless, except for the LOX song and the Gangstarr song. The only truly classic soundtrack has been the Show, partly because of the sweet interviews, and partly because of the good music. The State Property soundtrack/debut album isn’t bad, and, the truth is, it’s decent. The CD might not be worth 15.99, but it is definitely worth a few bucks or a download.


The first single, Roc da Mic, is catchy and provides a decent look at the rest of the album. It’s the best song (which I believe the single usually should be), but the album sounds a lot like it, beat-wise and in lyrical content. Beanie Sigel and Freeway, his protégé, come off nice together and trade pretty good verses. Their lyrical content isn’t spectacular, but they are saved by their humor and good flow. Check Beanie’s verse from Roc Da Mic: "It's Mack-daddy-young strappy/No he ain't the OG gangsta/Yes I is! come on don't test I kid/I firebomb cribs like Left Eye did/Notorious like that Bed-Stuy kid, B.I.G. or small you can get it/Dead wrong, like tryin to brawl a strong armored midget." The humor is obvious, and Sigel’s flow is one of the better flows in all of rap music.


The production on State Property is pretty good on most songs, but mediocre on others. It features a lot of the production of Just Blaze, the producer of 'Girls, Girls, Girls' and 'U Don’t Know' on the Blueprint, and a little of Kanye West, 'IZZO (H.O.V.A.)' and 'The Takeover' being his most popular production credits. Both of them bring pretty good tracks, but very few of the beats are even half as memorable as their efforts from the Blueprint. The production rarely overshadows the rhymes, which is what you usually want, except for the problem of the rhymes on State Property being less than spectacular.


As stated before, Beanie Sigel is pretty damn good. Freeway is also pretty decent, he has sort of a “sing-song”-y type flow, though it never strays into R & B type crooning. The fact that his voice is so rugged and grimy makes his flow very unique. The problem is, after listening to the album through more than 20 times, I still can’t really tell the rest of State Property apart. Chris & Sparks sound a lot alike, in flow and voice, and their rhymes are not memorable enough to interest me in either solo material or to do any research about them. Neef, Chris’ partner in the Young Guns, is only on one song, and it is the definite skip of the album, Sun Don’t Shine. O is entirely forgettable, too. None of their rhymes are horrid, but they just aren’t interesting enough, especially compared to Sigel and Freeway.


The nice thing about the album is that it’s entirely self-contained. The only guest on the album is Rocafella’s artist Rell, and who’s going to buy the album for Rell? No Jay-Z.. no Memphis Bleek.. no Ja Rule.. no Snoop... it’s a welcome departure from the norm in rap music. An album should stand on its own legs, whether they be weak, strong, or, like State Property’s, rough and solid, but still a bit wobbly. The strength of songs like Roc da Mic, Freeway’s awesome solo International Hustler, and the Sigel-Rell duet “Don’t Realize” make State Property a pretty decent first time out effort. However, the album drags because of often lackadaisical production (in comparison to all of Jay-Z’s albums, Memphis Bleek’s albums, and both of Sigel’s solos), and the sometimes weak rhymes. There are just a few too many songs on the album that aren’t terrible, but provide nothing to stay tuned to, like Sun Don’t Shine, Trouble Man, and Bitch Niggaz. This makes State Property a worthy purchase at a used CD store, but nothing to get too excited over.