Revisiting J.Cole’s Born Sinner
Tonight is the launch of KOD, J.Cole’s new album, so I’m revisiting his discography to prepare for the new release.
I really like For Your Eyez Only, I reviewed it here. Forest Hills Drive is his best album (as much praise as it gets, it’s still underrated), and Born Sinner is my least favorite.
I’ve been thinking about why it’s my least favorite from him. I realized that it’s not a bad album, but it has too many filler songs. There’s 16 songs all together (21 on the deluxe), and if it was cut in half on both versions, it would be a more impressive album: I don’t start enjoying the album until the 6th song, and from there, it gets really good. 1
Here’s the songs I would keep:
- Trouble
- Runaway
- She Knows
- Rich N
- Chaining Day
- Crooked Smile
- Let Nas Down
- Born Sinner
These eight would remove any fluff that prevents this album from being great.
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The first five songs have lyrics that make me cringe, two interludes, a pop-single, and a song that uses a classic Outkast song, but doesn’t do it justice. ↩