Album Review: Big Sean - Finally Famous

I must say, I was debating whether or not to even give this album a listen. My only real previous experience with Big Sean was his guest verses on Kanye's GOOD Friday series where he usually managed to put out the worst verse on any track he was featured on. Suffice to say, Finally Famous left me pleasantly surprised. The production - almost exclusively handled by No I.D. - is fantastic and thanks to a slew of guests the albums choruses are outstanding.

As for Big Sean himself, well, he's no Drake or Kanye but he is a lot better than I gave him credit for. His content isn't exactly varied but he's not rehashing the same work over and over again either and at times his lyrics are reasonably personal and revealing. His flow is competent but he does make an effort to vary it. Delivery wise Sean's rather bland and monotone and his attempts at, what I can only call, 'swagging it up', almost all fail miserably.

Boy, I’m cock-a-mania
The most zaniest, insaniant
Pulling up in Merced-iance
Rolling up like I’m Damian
I love girls that Arabian, Albanian, caucasian

You'll have a tough time finding lyrics more cringe worthy than that. That said, his lyricism is actually somewhat witty and impressive at times, though he does have some rather horrific punchlines and and attempts at wordplay. On the flip side, he has the ability to bring meaning and poignancy to his music, with tracks such as 'Don't Tell Me You Love Me' and the John Legend assisted 'Memories'.

While Big Sean is overshadowed somewhat by the albums production and guests (Lupe's verse is stunning) the album is still really enjoyable and likely to go down as one of the years better commercial releases within the genre.

Highlights: Memories, Don't Tell Me You Love Me, Wait For Me
Lowlights: Dance(Ass)

Rating: 7.5/10