The title says it all. In an outlaw medium (i.e. rap), Hammer is way too legit. According to the press release accompanying this record, he’s sold “13.5 million units.” He’s got a Saturday morning cartoon and a doll in his image, just like Pee-Wee Herman. He has dropped “M.C.” from the front of his stage name, apparently to distance himself from the rap/hip-hop genre (the press release says he was “pigeon-holed as a ‘rap’ artist”) and clear the way for him to achieve truly transcendental celebrity status and join Michael and Madonna as a pop music demi-god.

He’s so legit he’s got to quit. The best hip-hop is music of contradiction: beautiful poetry depicting terrifying scenes, party music that educates, old sounds used to express new ideas. Hammer’s music contains no contradictions, and therefore no depth: just easily recognizable samples and choruses repeated ad nauseum. It’s an album-length Pepsi commercial, and by December continuous airplay will have tattooed it on your brain. Hammer’s publicity refers to him not as a singer, but as a franchise. Franchise is an appropriate word. Listening to this record is a lot like eating at a fast food stand—bland, predictable and unsatisfying.