What do you get when you mix MTV and hip hop, with a twist of P. Diddy and a nationwide search? You get the newest addition to the Bad Boy Entertainment label, Da Band. Following their hit TV show "Making the Band II," the group has recently dropped their debut album, "Too Hot For T.V." Maybe the more appropriate title would be "Too Warm For T.V."; as a nice medium between the album's hot and cold moments.
The show's portrayal of the band as an assemblage of cocky delinquents who were always at each others' throats leaves fans asking the same questions: Will they work our their differences and put out a quality CD? Or are they destined to fade away to nothing now that the show is over?
Da Band brings together Sara (the R&B singer), Chopper aka Young City (the iced-out youngest member of the group), Babs (the female rapper from Brooklyn), Ness (the leader), Fred (the thumbsucking bad boy with the Ja Rule voice), and Dylan (the reggae rapper from Grenada). The album deals with life in the hood, partying all night long and hooking up.And don't worry; like any other P. Diddy produced album, it has his personal signature. There is at least one shout out to Bad Boy, P. Diddy, Da Band, or "Too Hot For T.V." on every single track of the album.
The album opens up strong with "My Life," a noteworthy rap ballad. With a dark blues kind of groove, this track is comparable to "Sing For the Moment" and "One Mic" ("Life is what you make/ Though it may sound basic/ Going through some bad times/ While we're faithful for the good time"). The track exudes soul and passion as da band members give their personal accounts of life on the street. The message is one of inspiration and motivation: matter where you come from, you can still be a Somebody. It takes a track like this for you to truly understand what rappers go through before being elevated to superstar status.
After a few more high energy, upbeat tracks with catchy hooks, we get to one of the album's most commercialized and disappointing songs, the first single, "Bad Boy This Bad Boy That." In countless interviews, Da Band claims that they've put aside their differences and grown together as a group.If this is the case, then why does the premier single of the album only feature four of the group's members? Not only does it lack in members of the group, it lacks strong, powerful lyrics that are essential for any hit record. Between lyrics like "Bad Boy this and Bad Boy that/ Bad Boy will beat you down wit a baseball bat," making shout outs to Diddy, the TV show and background music that sounds like it came out of a 1980s video game, it's hard to think of the group as an artistic entity instead of just another manufactured puppet of reality TV."Bad Boy This Bad Boy That" might have been "cute" as the theme song to Making the Band II, but as a single
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