Review: Rules & Regulations

Rules & Regulations is A LOT.

Having blown it slightly with In At The Deep End, it was important Roll Deep came back with a big record and this is it.

Danny Weed, Target and Wiley have served up a wicked range of productions for a start. It's kind of old-school Grime, in the sense that the tracks aren't overloaded with squeaky chipmunk vocals. There are also some references to styles past such as the "sino-grime" infused Celebrate produced by Danny Weed. Even the token R&G tracks are heavy. Ride or Die Chick is reminiscent of Dizzee's downtempo track Imagine off of Showtime and Floating Thru The Sky produced by Chunky Bizzle provides welcome respite from the albums aggressive sound at the halfway point.

The most impressive thing about this mixtape is its consistency. While there are a few stand out tracks like Badman and Babylon Burner, the rest hold up well too. Special mentions should go to tunes like Do Dis Ting and Pen Pals, which retain a slight pop flavour from the Relentless days, but don't compromise the grime sound.

Little needs to be said about the quality of Roll Deep's MCs. The addition of Skepta to this album is definitely beneficial, with him dropping particularly big bars on Do Dis Ting. Elsewhere Riko holds down the chorus on Pen Pals well and Scratchy and Breeze add a nice finishing verse to Babylon Burner. All in all it's the show of talent you'd expect from a crew of this calibre.

If there is criticism to be had it would merely be the contradictions of the lyrical content. While Roll Deep are to be commended for producing a quality edutainment track in the form of Badman, some of the subsequent gun lyrics jar somewhat. Given that Roll Deep seem so aware of the dangers of gun crime it does seem strange that there are still boasts of rolling with guns. This is a minor criticism in the context of the album though, as Badman has it's influence elsewhere in the media world.

Roll Deep have started the year with a bang. Hopefully this will force others to up their game, and if so we're in for quite a year.