Album "C" True Hollywood Stories Author "bigd99999", Epinions.com Rating Back to overview » C-True Hollywood Stories kicks off with "Introduction", which parodies the famous television biographical show "E-True Hollywood Stories" on the "E! Entertainment Television" cable network. The album's title mirrors the introduction, which has a vocal narration by a similar sounding man from the television show, speaking about Canibus' earlier career in a nutshell. Basically, a useless, yet creative intro. Canibus begins his mockery with "Stan Lives", stealing one of Eminem's fictional characters featured on "Stan" from the Marshall Mathers LP. Canibus starts out by sort of poking fun at overused skits and how many commercial rappers provide useless skits on their albums to make it seem bigger, or more packed. The majority of these skits act as filler, simple as that. This skit however, is sort of a prelude to the next track. Basically, the skit picks up after Eminem's song left off, with Stan actually being alive and surviving the drowning, focusing his anger on Marshall Mathers himself. In case you have absolutely no clue to what im talking about, read my review on the Eminem album to find out about this track. This leads right into "U Didn't Care", which is the first satire on 'Bis album. Basically Canibus points his disses at Eminem, poking fun at his ideals and rap styles. Bis adapts a nasally, high-pitched voice, sounding like Eminem, and sounding even more like Eminem's Stan character, playing his role. Bis even attempts the song to sound like an Eminem record, with its Dr. Dre-ish overproduced synthesized beat and melancholy chorus, often featured on songs by Eminem and his mentor Dr. Dre. Canibus plays Stan and raps about his emergence from the water, his hatred towards Eminem, and his newfound friendship with Bis, taking the Stan character in a new direction. Canibus pokes fun at Eminem's sort of mainstream appeals, yet you would think there would be mutual respect between the two dope lyricists, but apparently not as Canibus gets a tiny bit personal on a few of his lines towards Eminem: "It was the day you came to his video shoot with DJ, Jimmy's nephew, 'Clef stepped to him and told him he should step to you, That you was ghost writin for L, but that wasn't true, You was lookin at him the same way I'm lookin at you, Why can't we be friends Em', I don't want nothin from you, You see there's a little bit of Stan in all of us, Tell me where you think all of these record sales sparred from, Talkin 'bout Britney and Christina Aguilera, Nsync too, have you ever looked in a mirror?, Your hair ain't really blonde, and ya eyes ain't blue, So never diss me, cuz when you diss me your dissin you...". This is the track that began the sort of jabbed mini-battle that he and Em took part of for the mid part of 2002. However, it honestly didn't evolve into anything. Canibus rips down commercial singles on the aptly, and humorously titled "The Rip Off". Taking a page from the page of Jay-Z on "22 Two's" for the chorus, Bis mixes up his real style with his false style on this track. The very interesting thing that i feel i need to point out is that Canibus is using this track to sort of mock Jay-Z and other sell-out rappers who were formerly great artists. Canibus basically tells through his creativity that many commercial rappers include a handful of tracks on their overpacked albums which remind the artists of the time when they were in their prime, ala Jay-Z. It takes a true hip-hop head to truly appreciate the exact message that Canibus is putting out. Now, as for the actual song, Canibus spits some pretty tight braggadiocio, refusing to stay on topic, reminiscing on the style used on his first two albums. His wordplay and similes are great, but lyrically are nowhere near the level of excellence found on his first two albums. He even chooses to throw in some disses to Wyclef, but nothing major. Bis shows some intellect, but in the tradition of commercial rap, never follows through. The beat is an egyptian-style beat which is definetely made for clubs, reminding me of the recent Truth Hurts single "Addicted". This track isn't really bad on both counts, and is one of the major highlights of this album. Bis continues his mockery of commercial hip-hop with "C - T.H.S. (Title Track)". Canibus completely mocks commercial rap in a way that its difficult to not burst out laughing here. Besides the fact that the production is overproduced dribble, Canibus is the one who shines. On this track, Bis pokes fun at the rare times when commercial rappers try to storytell, hence the title. Besides the fact that his flow is terribly off-beat and choppy, his lyrics are pointless and simplistic. On the first verse, he spits nonsensical trash about his birth, which is off-beat like a motha'. On the second verse he speaks about his meeting with the Lost Boys and his breakthrough, and on the third verse he raps about meeting Stan and the rest of his "crew". The fourth verse absolutely makes no sense as he switches from storytelling to weak braggadiocio. His rhyme schemes are also just as crapped up, with 3 bar rhyme schemes not matching whatsoever. The chorus itself is terribly simplistic and boring. Bis' refusal to give us a good flow is mind-bogglingly hilarious, as well as his refusal to stay on topic and use any sort of complexities in his rhyme really showcases the creative bones in Bis' body. "A Different Vibe in L.A." finds Canibus taking shots at west coast rappers and the bling-bling mentality. Canibus seemingly put a lot of thought into this album, as he has yet to dissapoint us or leave out anything. On this track, Bis switches up his style to a bling-bling style, rapping about the lavish lifestyle that he lives. However, once again refusing to stay on topic, he switches the second verse to rapping about females and violence, which is typical commercial / gangsta rapper subject matter. Its outstanding how creative Canibus gets, seemingly pulling lines from the minds of sell-outs, giving us terrible, terrible rhymes and changing the subject matter each verse. The pseudo-R&B chorus and piano influenced beat is another blatant rip down of commercial rap, executed perfectly. Canibus rips down overproduced whackness on the hilarous "I Gotta Story 2 Tell". The production is the first blatant diss, featuring an overproduced, oversynthesized beat with some annoying high-pitched samples and pseudo-R&B sounds, typically used in commercial rap singles. Canibus' switches his voice to a more high-pitched vocal style, sort of mocking the cliche-style of a variety of sell-outs. He also mocks the fact that a lot of rappers just put rhymes together that rhyme without putting any thought or intelligence, ala Cam'ron and David Banner. His very few moments of good lyricism shine a bit, but the production is the more hilarious aspect, as it keeps trying to make up its mind as to whether its a pseudo-R&B track or a club track. The most memorable part of the song has to be the opening lines by Bis, which make absolutely no sense: "Ono wan make beef outta steam fish?, Tell ya artist keep my name out they mouth or you wont have no peace, Compared to Canibus ya pitbulls is poultry, You and Biggie made a dope team but i roast beans". "Stan N Can" is a useless skit with Bis and Stan riding in a limousine being ridden to an award show that Canibus is going to attend. This serves no purpose on the album at all, poking fun at the variety of commercial cds which are loaded with worthless skits. Nice touch in my opinion. One of the more nostalgic and funnier moments on the album have to come from "Hate U 2". Canibus' lyricism, besides the fact that its purposely simplistic and uninspired, takes a backseat to the memorable beat and chorus. Bis' raps against all of those "haters" who diss on his "style". If that aint commercial rap sh*t... i dont know what is. Production-wise, the beat is an extremely simplistic featuring synthesizers and samples from old video games, poking fun at overproduced commercial songs. Besides that, to add fuel to the flame, Bis brings along an unheard of guest artist named Pak-Man, which raps gangsta lyrics reminiscent of something 50 Cent or Mack-10 would spit. On top of all of this nonsense, this track features one of the most juvenile and hilarious choruses ever crafted from a human being's mind: "Is the reason why you keep callin my name out of the blue, If it's because you hate me, then I hate you too, We heard it through the Grapevine and now we know it's true, Just tell me that you hate me, I'll say I hate you too.... Ah-ha, ah-ha! We found out you was hatin on us!, Ah-ha, ah-ha! We found out you was hatin on us!". That should be enough to get you to purchase this... If anybody reading this enjoy commercial triple-cadence speed rappers, be sure to skip over "Stop Smokin'", as we find 'Bis dismantling them piece by piece. Canibus returns to poking fun at club track, with a very poorly produced, simplistic beat featuring a reccuringly annoying snare and simplistic synthesizers, Canibus brings us humor in the finest possible way. The lyricism is among the poorest ever found, specially on a Bis album. At times it makes me think if Canibus actually put deep thought into making his lyrics simplistic, avoiding any sort of complexity whatsoever on this track. His lyrics are uninspired as f*ck, but remember, its all in fun. The subject matter revolves around a man choosing between drugs and a relationship, which wouldn't be so bad is Bis wasn't purposely yanking our chain. Besides all that ive explained, Bis brings along his "crew", named C-4 (an obvious parody of Eminem's D-12 group). Besides Bis, Pak-Man pops in as well as an unnamed female with a synthesized high-pitched voice, hilariously poking fun at the terribly untalented female emcees such as Lil Kim and Trina. Oh yeah, and the chorus is excellent when it comes to getting a laugh. By now, if you dont get the joke, then quit reading and don't buy it. But if you wanna know more... read on my friend... "Lemmie Hear Sumthin’ Else" could possibly be the most lyrical track on this album as Canibus gets as blatant as possible. Besides an overproduced synthesized beat, the subject matter and lyricism are what make this a classic, in my opinion. Canibus touches on everything commercial and materialistic rappers, from jewelry to money and etc. However, instead of Bis taking the role of these rappers, he sort of takes them down and mocks them. On the chorus, we find Bis telling them to shut the f*ck up. Canibus goes to war with commercial emcees, tearing them apart piece by piece, with above average flows, metaphors, and similes. Here we find Canibus vividly explaining the message he has been putting out on this album about commercial sell-outs. It doesn't take a genius to figure it out. Canibus takes commercial pseudo-R&B love ballads to a whole new level with "Hott Tonight". Canibus is hysterical with his intentional mysogony, lowering his lyrical standards to mono-syllabalistic flows, barely rhyming words, and a vocabulary seemingly pulled from a 2nd grade classroom. Canibus pokes fun at the soft-thug rappers who go from rapping about killing people to feeling true emotions for a female. One word: bullsh*t, and Bis knows it. Listen to this and enjoy. "Gotta Get That Doe!" is Canibus' confession claiming that the album is a joke, only in lyrics. But, do NOT think that this track is not funny, because its funny due to one underlining attribute, which many fans may not get on their first listens. Canibus' opinion seemingly changes with each line, as on one line he disses commercial rap claiming that selling records dont mean anything, yet a couple of bars later goes back to claiming that he's got tons of money. Besides the fact that the lyrics and subject matter, or lack there of, are hilarious, you can count that the beat and chorus match. Bis not only copies the melody, but the exact bassline from the "Macarena". Dont miss out on this humorous song. We return to the old-style of Canibus on "R U Lyrically Fit?". Its sort of refreshing to hear Canibus return to the wicked, venomous battle style that we've been accustomed to in the past. Dark, Saddening production perfectly fits Bis' tight flows and simile-packed verses. Do not even think that since the track doesn't follow in the same path as the rest of the album, and refrains from its humorous tones, that its a bad thing. In my opinion, its refreshing to hear Bis back to his old style, and perhaps neccessary so that his real fans would be insured that he's no sell-out. He is joined by Luminati, aka Louie Lombard, who drops a below-average verse, but of course, Bis is the main attraction anyways. "Ya Teef is Yellow" is a hilarious return to the mockery style of Canibus. Canibus pokes fun at commercial rappers who love to put filler tracks on their album with terrible, unthoughtful production. Bis exceeds here way past his limits, as this track had me literally rolling on the ground laughing at the idiocy. Bis pokes fun at people with yellow teeth, which is arguably some of the poorest subject matter ever. He spits the rhymes as if he is reading them from a Dr. Seuss book, due to his focus. The backdrop, featuring snapping fingers and hilarious vocals, only adds to the satirical atmosphere of the track. "Luv U 2" is purely a sequel to "Hate U 2", only flipped. This time Bis raps about people who love him and what he loves. The hilarious message that he is sending out to us is that commercial rappers are the kings of hypocrisy, going so far as to re-use a tired beat and completely flip the subject matter. Its humorous to hear Bis make light of all of these subjects, but its sad due to the fact that it is 100% true. Commercial Sell-out rappers are extreme hypocrits, switching subject matter and blocking off what they previously said. Very Very Funny idea. Oh yeah, Pak-man is back. Its very strange to listen to a track like "Box Cutta", due to the enigmatic purpose. Its difficult to tell what Canibus was trying to accomplish here, as the beat is well-produced, but Bis off-beat when it comes to the flow, featuring a triple-cadence style over a relatively slow-paced instrumental. Canibus' lyrics are highly above average, even though they have their shades of materialism and uninspired vocabulary, but aren't too bad. This track is a big mystery, but not bad whatsoever. C-4 joins Canibus on "Draft Me", which is a return to the humorous tone of the album. Production-wise, it sort of pokes fun at pseudo-rocknroll rappers who insist of using hard guitars on all their songs, but its not terribly bad production, but nothing good at all. Id say mediocre and average would be a good choice of words. Canibus comes on the track, constantly switching his subject matter over and over again, so quick that its difficult to tell when he actually makes the switch without repeated listens. His lyrics range poor to average, very rarely spitting anything of any worth, much less any intelligence. The chorus is very commercial. Surprisingly, Canibus returns to play the part of Stan on the last verse of the song, which is a nice touch. "One of My Favorites" is the first outro, which is, like the intro, having the man read a quote from a Canibus freestyle, which aint bad. Its pretty pointless, but sends a message to fans about commercial rappers and how desperate they are, as he's shown us throughout the album. Canibus chooses to end C-True Hollywood Stories with a pretty useless musical "Outro", and then a hidden track, which is Bis spitting rhymes recorded from a live show, which is the same rhymes given to us on the first outro, which brings this album to an end. C-True Hollywood Stories is not Canibus fouling out or falling off, its a showcase of humor, and an underlining message which very few heads understand, even some loyal Bis fans. This album is definetely not a classic, as Canibus has come close to achieving that but always seems to miss by inches, but it is a fun album and in my opinion, entertaining to those who will give it a chance. However, i will back them up by saying this, with time, this album may degrade, as it is already doing with me. But i still reccomend it due to the fact that Canibus speaks the truth and that there are very few other albums out there like it. So yes... if you have a great sense of humor you're in the mood to watch Bis poke joke after joke at the hip-hop recording industry, then by all means... buy this album. If not, then stick to other Bis albums to pick up.