What really makes the album work are the soul music samples that dominate most of its tracks. But they are outweighed by songs like “It’s Over” (a eulogy for the thug life, which Ghostface has now outgrown) and “Save Me Dear” (redemption through a good woman’s love - corny and a bit patriarchal, but moving all the same) and the Missy Elliott collaboration “Tush” (a spunky, upbeat sex song, that many of the fans have denounced as lightweight and commercial, but whose beat I really like, not to mention Missy’s “if you ain’t slurpin’, then you better off jerkin’ “).Īnd, though I usually hate the “skits” that populate recent hip hop albums for some reason, the ones here work for me, in a slice-of-life meets comedic-exaggeration way). There are some great gangsta narratives on the album, particularly “Run” (produced by Wu mastermind RZA) with its urgency, speed and off-the-beat rhymes. But for my part, this is precisely why I like Pretty Toney more than anything else Ghostface has ever done. This seems to be because, in dropping the “Killah” from his name, Ghostface has changed the ratio between hard-headed thug narratives and squishy love songs, having less of the former and more of the latter. Judging from what I’ve read on fan websites and bulletin boards, the true Ghostface Killah fans don’t like this one as much as his earlier solo work, Ironman and Supreme Clientele. Though I’ve never been a big devotee of the Wu, I’ve fallen in love with Ghostface‘s latest, The Pretty Toney Album.

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