Kenny Allstar has been a dominant figure in the world of UK Urban, Grime and Drill for as long as we can all remember. He runs ‘Mad About Bars’ while running a show on 1Xtra – he can do it all.
But, has Allstar’s new studio album met the incredibly high standards that he has set for himself on all his other platforms?
The album opens up with ‘Love the Game’ which features The Streets and Not3s. It’s an intense opening track which uses the iconic voice of The Streets very effectively. Not3s comes in with his own afro vocals which slot in nicely.
Kenny Allstar’s beat is good here, it has a very strong opening track feel to it, it is definitely just an album track and I’d be extremely surprised if this was Kenny’s next official single, even with Not3s in it.
The first single from the album, ‘Tracksuit Love’ featuring Headie One follows the opening song on the album, not much to say on this one, as I’m sure everyone who has listened to this album heard ‘Tracksuit Love’ ages ago. Nice track nevertheless.
Throughout the listening of this album, I was subconsciously comparing it to Charlie Sloth’s album, ‘The Plug’. But right from the get go of Block Diaries I could see that this was a very Drill orientated album. Which is cool – but I doubt it’s going to get the same commercial recognition of Charlie Sloth’s project.
Track number 3 is one of my favourite songs from the album. ‘Stepped In (Sexy Back)’, featuring Suspect, Afro B and Swift is much more of an afro type beat. I was excited to see Suspect being on the feature list on this album, and his flow is sick, especially over a more afro type beat.
Suspect also features in track 7 ‘Cocoon’ which also includes Nafe Smallz. This is where the album makes the transition from a very varied album, towards a more of a drill oriantated album. Suspect again lay his verse down well. Am I convinced by Nafe Smallz however? I’m not sure.
If Kenny was going to go for a Drill sound for the majority of this project then he needed to get some serious names on the feature list. He definitely did for track 10 ‘Tryna Do Me’ which features SL. I’m a huge fan of SL, and on this track he sticks to his own style and Kenny facilities for that perfectly, with a sick beat with heavy bass and some light keys on the piano.
My favourite song from the album is track 16 which features the chief, M Huncho. Huncho has a very exciting future coming, I have been a huge fan of him since he dropped the ’48 Hours’ EP. Again, it’s more of a drill beat again but Huncho comes with a different energy which turns a standard drill beat into his own vibe which nobody can replicate. I can definitely see M Huncho working with Kenny Allstar in the future, and I think Kenny would be stupid not to.
As a whole, the album is good. It is produced really well with a good variety of different beats – even if the majority are drill beats. As I said, It’s hard to not subconsciously compare this album to Charlie Sloth’s project. However they are both so different – and this album especially shows that DJ’s can be producers – and I hope this Kenny Allstar projects encourages more DJ’s to switch lanes in their careers every so often.
Rating: 3/5
Written by Jack Lynch
Jack Lynch 