Rating: NNN
Remember Black Rob of the Bad Boy family? You know, in 99 he had that single Whoa, where every line ended with “like whoa?” Man, that song was like whoa. But after scoring that hit, the marketing and release of Rob’s debut, Life Story, got screwed up, and no one really heard the Harlem rapper’s full range (which was definitely not like whoa). Six years later, on his Diddy-backed re-up, Black Rob avoids getting typecast by Whoa-like gimmickry, delivering an overlong but generally solid album with a handful of burners (one or two of the beats are jalapeño-hot) that showcase his streetwise sharpness like whoa.