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From Rolling Stone: Source
From All Hip Hop: Source/
Also worth noting, the Real Life Fantasy Video premiered on BET 106 & Park today to a positive buzz. I'll just say it now... it's ok for ya'll to like Ja Rule again... With PIL2 dropping at the end of the month, Over the next few months everyone else will tell you that as well.
By Sowmya Krishnamurthy
February 8, 2012 3:50 PM ET
Ja Rule, 'Pain Is Love 2'
MPire, Fontana
Ja Rule – cigar ablaze and drink in hand – stares down and caresses a bound and gagged woman with the word "Fame" tattooed across her bare chest. The back cover art for his forthcoming Pain Is Love 2 (due February 28th) is an apt representation of the rapper and how he views his own celebrity: constraining, toxic, but ultimately seductive.
Grappling with fame was the overarching theme as a small group of writers previewed PIL2 Tuesday night (February 7th) with executive producer Seven (7 Aurelius) at Manhattan's Quad Studios. Seven was a fitting surrogate/guide – Ja is currently incarcerated and serving two years at Mid-State Correctional Facility in Oneida, N.Y. for gun possession and tax evasion – having worked with the rapper for a number of years on their collective biggest hits ("Always on Time" featuring Ashanti, "I'm Real (Remix)" with Jennifer Lopez). They recorded PIL2 in two months, finishing the final song "Pray 4 The Day" ironically the day before Ja was locked up.
"Rule and I made history," Seven mused nostalgically before playing the album.
The operative word of course, is "made", as Ja Rule's fall from grace reads like a textbook rolling of heads from HBO's Game of Thrones. Ja reigned supreme in the late 1990s/early 2000s with a myriad of hits that straddled that all-important line, appeasing women without leaving male fans feeling emasculated. His spot was usurped by newcomer and fellow Queens rapper 50 Cent when 50 threw a string of jabs and marked Ja the pariah du jour. In hip-hop, you were either a 50 Cent fan or a Ja Rule fan and there was no in between. Once Ja was completely marginalized, 50 dealt the real coup de grâce, co-opting an identical musical style and garnering tremendous success.
PIL2 is a loose concept that follows this trajectory. Ja swallows one pill ("pil" stemming from the acronym for Pain Is Love) and becomes immensely successful. He then downs another and finds himself on a bad trip, surrounded by haters and superficiality. "I'm crying everyone's tears," moans Ja on the album opener "Fuck Fame" featuring Leah Siegal, which quickly moves into the thumping, angry percussion of "Real Life Fantasy" featuring Anita Louise. "I'm a rock star/Rick James Mick Jagger/Bright light big stages bad habits/Get high got to prison and evade taxes/This is not what I envisioned/when I started rapping," he gruffly spits with the utmost conviction. "Parachute" and "Drown" further outline the despair of a man spiraling. "You should be smarter/don't jump off the deep end", the rapper says on "Parachute" to his fickle fans and then laments, "Only the flyest niggas get to fall."
Seven's adept production adds heft to every track and melds with Ja's still-pristine bark. On "Never Had Time," which samples "The Way It Is" by Bruce Hornsby and the Range that 2Pac famously flipped on "Changes," there are moments when Ja's timbre emits the same vulnerability as Pac. Lush violins, pounding drums; everything sounds bigger at the hands of Seven. "Spun A Web" featuring Amina cleverly intersperses parts of Coldplay's "Trouble" and when the band refused to clear the sample, the producer reinterpreted the instrumentals on his own with stellar results. Features are relegated mostly to newcomers, aside from Kalenna of Dirty Money, because according to Seven, rapper Rick Ross was the only notable who agreed to contribute to the album (Ross' recent health ailments deterred him from actually recording).
The album's concept deviates briefly, specifically on "Black Vodka" and "Superstar". "Black Vodka" is more reminiscent of traditional Ja fare, a female-friendly cut that draws the metaphor between a sexy woman and vodka with lines like "She goes down so smooth." The bouncy "Superstar" is requisite braggadocio about "Living life like a movie star" and "Making love like a porn star." Not groundbreaking exactly, but they're sonically welcome and cut through what could otherwise be 13 tracks of downers.
The concept comes full circle in the end on the introspective stand out "Pray 4 The Day" featuring Leah Siegal. Ja raps plaintively to his fans to remain steadfast during his sabbatical, "Love is pain and all I ask is y'all to keep Rule in your prayers."
This mirrors real life in which, according to a statement, Ja has undergone a full mental and physical transformation in prison including starting college courses, working on a biographical television show concept and penning a series of letters to possibly be published. Whether PIL2 will resurrect the fallen king and return him as a formidable force in hip-hop remains to be seen.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/ne...#ixzz1lqsdTKIR
February 8, 2012 3:50 PM ET
Ja Rule, 'Pain Is Love 2'
MPire, Fontana
Ja Rule – cigar ablaze and drink in hand – stares down and caresses a bound and gagged woman with the word "Fame" tattooed across her bare chest. The back cover art for his forthcoming Pain Is Love 2 (due February 28th) is an apt representation of the rapper and how he views his own celebrity: constraining, toxic, but ultimately seductive.
Grappling with fame was the overarching theme as a small group of writers previewed PIL2 Tuesday night (February 7th) with executive producer Seven (7 Aurelius) at Manhattan's Quad Studios. Seven was a fitting surrogate/guide – Ja is currently incarcerated and serving two years at Mid-State Correctional Facility in Oneida, N.Y. for gun possession and tax evasion – having worked with the rapper for a number of years on their collective biggest hits ("Always on Time" featuring Ashanti, "I'm Real (Remix)" with Jennifer Lopez). They recorded PIL2 in two months, finishing the final song "Pray 4 The Day" ironically the day before Ja was locked up.
"Rule and I made history," Seven mused nostalgically before playing the album.
The operative word of course, is "made", as Ja Rule's fall from grace reads like a textbook rolling of heads from HBO's Game of Thrones. Ja reigned supreme in the late 1990s/early 2000s with a myriad of hits that straddled that all-important line, appeasing women without leaving male fans feeling emasculated. His spot was usurped by newcomer and fellow Queens rapper 50 Cent when 50 threw a string of jabs and marked Ja the pariah du jour. In hip-hop, you were either a 50 Cent fan or a Ja Rule fan and there was no in between. Once Ja was completely marginalized, 50 dealt the real coup de grâce, co-opting an identical musical style and garnering tremendous success.
PIL2 is a loose concept that follows this trajectory. Ja swallows one pill ("pil" stemming from the acronym for Pain Is Love) and becomes immensely successful. He then downs another and finds himself on a bad trip, surrounded by haters and superficiality. "I'm crying everyone's tears," moans Ja on the album opener "Fuck Fame" featuring Leah Siegal, which quickly moves into the thumping, angry percussion of "Real Life Fantasy" featuring Anita Louise. "I'm a rock star/Rick James Mick Jagger/Bright light big stages bad habits/Get high got to prison and evade taxes/This is not what I envisioned/when I started rapping," he gruffly spits with the utmost conviction. "Parachute" and "Drown" further outline the despair of a man spiraling. "You should be smarter/don't jump off the deep end", the rapper says on "Parachute" to his fickle fans and then laments, "Only the flyest niggas get to fall."
Seven's adept production adds heft to every track and melds with Ja's still-pristine bark. On "Never Had Time," which samples "The Way It Is" by Bruce Hornsby and the Range that 2Pac famously flipped on "Changes," there are moments when Ja's timbre emits the same vulnerability as Pac. Lush violins, pounding drums; everything sounds bigger at the hands of Seven. "Spun A Web" featuring Amina cleverly intersperses parts of Coldplay's "Trouble" and when the band refused to clear the sample, the producer reinterpreted the instrumentals on his own with stellar results. Features are relegated mostly to newcomers, aside from Kalenna of Dirty Money, because according to Seven, rapper Rick Ross was the only notable who agreed to contribute to the album (Ross' recent health ailments deterred him from actually recording).
The album's concept deviates briefly, specifically on "Black Vodka" and "Superstar". "Black Vodka" is more reminiscent of traditional Ja fare, a female-friendly cut that draws the metaphor between a sexy woman and vodka with lines like "She goes down so smooth." The bouncy "Superstar" is requisite braggadocio about "Living life like a movie star" and "Making love like a porn star." Not groundbreaking exactly, but they're sonically welcome and cut through what could otherwise be 13 tracks of downers.
The concept comes full circle in the end on the introspective stand out "Pray 4 The Day" featuring Leah Siegal. Ja raps plaintively to his fans to remain steadfast during his sabbatical, "Love is pain and all I ask is y'all to keep Rule in your prayers."
This mirrors real life in which, according to a statement, Ja has undergone a full mental and physical transformation in prison including starting college courses, working on a biographical television show concept and penning a series of letters to possibly be published. Whether PIL2 will resurrect the fallen king and return him as a formidable force in hip-hop remains to be seen.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/ne...#ixzz1lqsdTKIR
From All Hip Hop: Source/
Ja Rule may deliver his best work behind bars. AllHipHop.com sat in an exclusive listening session for Ja Rules new album, Pain Is Love 2, the dark sequel.
“It absolutely matters. It’s a karma thing. It’s and energy thing. That resistance is no longer strong enough (to hold Ja Rule back).”
7 Aurelius (also known as Seven) explains. And it’s a lot.
Right now, towards the end of this session, he’s discussing whether or not 50 Cent’s decline in musical dominance matters to Ja Rule’s latest push.
The artsy, muscular
producer sits in a dimly lit studio in the outermost section of the legendary Quad Studios in Manhattan. His normally eccentric garb is replaced by a Yankee fitted and normal clothing as he talks his friend Ja Rule.
He’s conversing with a small, but influential cadre of journalists and bloggers that have come out on a listening session for Ja, who is presently serving two years on gun charges.
It’s a lot.
The pair have worked together in the past, but have deepened their relationship for the release of Ja’s new album, PIL2 (Pain Is Love 2). The album is a conceptual work that explains the downside of Fame, which is depicted as a woman on the inner album art. “F**k fame,” is a reoccurring, jagged theme.
The album is probably Ja’s most cohesive work to date, and it was recorded up until the day before he was transported to Mid-State Correctional Facility in upstate Oneida, N.Y.
It has not been easy for them to get PIL2 ready for the masses on February 28.
For one, there’s the Rick Ross debacle.
Leveling, Seven says, “A lot of the [artists of note] were not f**king with us. Rick Ross was the only artist that said, “Yeah.”
While Ja and Ross share a profound distaste for 50 Cent, the Miami rapper’s health took a turn for the worst with a pair of back-to-back seizures last year. Otherwise, he would have been the only recognizable name on the album.
“This album is [about] a man that is going to prison, and he’s opening up his soul,” Seven says, making eye contact with all of the writers. And his assessment of PIL2 is dead on. Ja Rule seems to regurgitate just about every emotion he’s felt since his decline in popularity stateside. (Seven makes it clear Rule is still poppin’ in the rest of the world, attributing the downslide to fickle American audiences.)
In the United States, it has been hard to change perception. Swizz Beatz, T.I. Weird Al Yankovic, and even 50 Cent have sampled Coldplay. But, the alternative rockers would not approve a sample for Ja’s “Spun A Web,” a song on PIL2 that tried to sample “Trouble.” “They turned us down so many times, we stopped asking, “ Seven laments.
“It’s hard to explain the mental state of someone going to jail for two years that’s been a star for 10 years.”
And Seven takes a moment to call out the sheepish masses.
“They can’t wait for [an authority] to say, ‘Its OK to like Ja again.’”
Until then, they believe that Pain Is Love 2 will be received as their most creative offering to date and a springboard for Ja’s post-jail career.
“I’m expecting this album to do very well,” Seven utters confidently. “This album is going to help [Ja] come out with the right perception [from fans] when he gets out of jail.”
Ja Rule expects to come home in February of 2013.
“I’m back where I started / A prisoner of my own success but hardly / Caring enough to know I’m dead without it / No cribs, no cars, no champagne / No bright lights, no bitches, no big stage / But f*ck it, I’m in a better place.”
Ja Rule on “They Spun A Web”
“It absolutely matters. It’s a karma thing. It’s and energy thing. That resistance is no longer strong enough (to hold Ja Rule back).”
7 Aurelius (also known as Seven) explains. And it’s a lot.
Right now, towards the end of this session, he’s discussing whether or not 50 Cent’s decline in musical dominance matters to Ja Rule’s latest push.
The artsy, muscular
producer sits in a dimly lit studio in the outermost section of the legendary Quad Studios in Manhattan. His normally eccentric garb is replaced by a Yankee fitted and normal clothing as he talks his friend Ja Rule.
He’s conversing with a small, but influential cadre of journalists and bloggers that have come out on a listening session for Ja, who is presently serving two years on gun charges.
It’s a lot.
The pair have worked together in the past, but have deepened their relationship for the release of Ja’s new album, PIL2 (Pain Is Love 2). The album is a conceptual work that explains the downside of Fame, which is depicted as a woman on the inner album art. “F**k fame,” is a reoccurring, jagged theme.
The album is probably Ja’s most cohesive work to date, and it was recorded up until the day before he was transported to Mid-State Correctional Facility in upstate Oneida, N.Y.
It has not been easy for them to get PIL2 ready for the masses on February 28.
For one, there’s the Rick Ross debacle.
Leveling, Seven says, “A lot of the [artists of note] were not f**king with us. Rick Ross was the only artist that said, “Yeah.”
While Ja and Ross share a profound distaste for 50 Cent, the Miami rapper’s health took a turn for the worst with a pair of back-to-back seizures last year. Otherwise, he would have been the only recognizable name on the album.
“This album is [about] a man that is going to prison, and he’s opening up his soul,” Seven says, making eye contact with all of the writers. And his assessment of PIL2 is dead on. Ja Rule seems to regurgitate just about every emotion he’s felt since his decline in popularity stateside. (Seven makes it clear Rule is still poppin’ in the rest of the world, attributing the downslide to fickle American audiences.)
In the United States, it has been hard to change perception. Swizz Beatz, T.I. Weird Al Yankovic, and even 50 Cent have sampled Coldplay. But, the alternative rockers would not approve a sample for Ja’s “Spun A Web,” a song on PIL2 that tried to sample “Trouble.” “They turned us down so many times, we stopped asking, “ Seven laments.
“It’s hard to explain the mental state of someone going to jail for two years that’s been a star for 10 years.”
And Seven takes a moment to call out the sheepish masses.
“They can’t wait for [an authority] to say, ‘Its OK to like Ja again.’”
Until then, they believe that Pain Is Love 2 will be received as their most creative offering to date and a springboard for Ja’s post-jail career.
“I’m expecting this album to do very well,” Seven utters confidently. “This album is going to help [Ja] come out with the right perception [from fans] when he gets out of jail.”
Ja Rule expects to come home in February of 2013.
“I’m back where I started / A prisoner of my own success but hardly / Caring enough to know I’m dead without it / No cribs, no cars, no champagne / No bright lights, no bitches, no big stage / But f*ck it, I’m in a better place.”
Ja Rule on “They Spun A Web”
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