Daz – So So Gangsta

Having made an appearance with Death Row, Daz eventually moved on to bigger and better things with Tha Dog Pound where he made a name for himself as an artist with a fair degree of talent. Yet this did not satisfy a voracious appetite for fame and he eventually gave the world Retaliation, Revenge & Get Back. After some attempts at doing it solo as well as a few collaborations with the likes of Kurupt and Snoop for the recent Cali Iz Active album, Daz eventually decided to try and make his mark with his latest, So So Gansta.

With Jermaine Dupri running the show, and collaborations with some acclaimed “Westside” artists (Rick Ross, Snoop Dogg, Ice Cube) the album was set to reach some new heights for this budding rapper trying to make it into the world of “album sales”. Unfortunately for Daz So So Gangsta falls short of being a very mediocre album. Whilst some of the tracks sound good and have some serious potential, others come across as clichéd and unoriginal. One gets tired of the west vs east rivalry that led to some great music initially highlighting the feud yet starts to get tiresome after a couple of decades of the same old music. DPG Fo’ Life, Money On My Mind, and Rat a Tat Tat all scream “Westside”, whilst The One and On Some Real are hollow and very lacking in soul. Badder Than A Mutha sounds like it was an attempt on Daz’s part to make it onto the radio and although it features Avery Storm, one just feels that it is still missing something.

For an artist that has been in the industry for such a long time, it is a pity that Daz’s influences remain one-sided making his latest solo attempt exactly as his title proclaims – so so.