Busta Rhymes
The Big Bang (4 stars)
If it seems like forever since we heard from Busta Rhymes, it's because he spent his four years away from the game searching for a label (he landed at Dr. Dre's Aftermath Records) and reviving an acting career with roles in 2002's Halloween: Resurrection and 2004's Full Clip.
Busta wasn't missed the way Jay-Z or Eminem are because he's always occupied a strange place in the survival-of-the-illest world of rap. Never really a top-of-the-food-chain emcee, his signature talent is adaptability. He evolved from a "conscious artist" with Leaders of the New School and Native Tongues to the hyperactive, bipolaresque rhymer we heard on "Woo-Hah" to a radio Romeo with a talent for club-friendly tunes "(Break Ya Neck").
While celebrating that adaptability, The Big Bang offers a new wrinkle: Busta as elder statesmen. He's toned down his usual party-and-bullshit vibe. He's more reflective ("In the Ghetto"), more attentive to the fact that not everyone lives like a baller and that, yes, some people break laws to put food on the table ("Cocaina"). But he hasn't gone all Nas on us, either. In fact, he one-ups himself with three club-friendly butt-shakers—including the Missy Elliott-assisted "How We Do It Over Here"—instead of the usual two.
Aside from "New York Shit," a poor excuse for a regional pride anthem, there aren't any glaring mistakes here. If Busta continues to evolve and improve, he might just work his way onto one of those greatest-ever lists.
GRAM PARSONS
The Complete Reprise Sessions (3 stars)
Considering that GP and Grievous Angel—the two solo albums completed by country-rock pioneer Gram Parsons before his 1973 death at age 26—are readily available on an inexpensive twofer CD, and that most of the same material was included (along with Parsons' best work with the International Submarine Band, the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers) on 2001's Gram Parsons Anthology, this three-disc boxed set chronicling the solo era practically screams "fan-gouging reissue."
Judging from reverent liner notes provided by musical partner Emmylou Harris and longtime friend/Rhino Records A&R man James Austin, however, the producers' intentions actually seem honorable: namely, paying deluxe, archival homage to Parsons' final musical cycle. Still, it's difficult to get excited about the radio interviews tacked onto the albums as bonus tracks or the slight variations in the alternate versions comprising Disc 3. In-studio performances of "Love Hurts" and "Sin City" make for more interesting add-ons, even if hissy sound quality keeps them from sounding transcendent.
To be sure, The Complete Reprise Sessions contains five-star-caliber music, but there's little here to warrant a pricey upgrade for all but the most minutiae-obsessed Parsons devotee.
Allison Moorer
Getting Somewhere (3 stars)
From the first notes of "Work to Do," the opening track on Allison Moorer's fifth studio album, you can tell that the singer-songwriter has made some drastic changes. Although she's steadily evolved from the traditional country of her debut to a sound that incorporates blues, rock and folk, Moorer takes a quantum leap forward on Getting Somewhere, recasting herself as a classic pop craftsperson in the vein of Elvis Costello or Chrissie Hynde. Getting Somewhere is full of jangly guitars, candy-coated girl-group harmonies and mostly sunny, optimistic lyrics, in contrast to the bleak outlook of 2004's The Duel.
There's still a twang in Moorer's voice, and some of the mellower songs have a country feel, but this is unabashedly a pop album, with polished production from fellow singer-songwriter Steve Earle, Moorer's husband. "I have to believe I'm getting somewhere," she sings on the title track, and the whole album has a similar positive outlook, even reimagining Moorer's mother's murder on "New Years Day" and finding hope in an abusive relationship on "How She Does It."
It's great that Moorer has embraced optimism and found happiness, but she sounds a little out of place, especially on the slickest tunes; in the future, she might want to look for a few dark clouds in her silver lining.