Various Artists: Crunk Hits Vol. 4 : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Like all empires, crunk has experienced some of its proudest moments on the downside of glory — some of us will never forget the touchingly hilarious sight of Lil Jon at the VMAs flashing his "Crunk Ain't Dead" necklace. On Crunk Hits Vol. 4, the embattled crunktopia rallies together — and proves that Lil Jon was right, because this volume is as woofer-eatingly jampacked as any of the others. True, it reaches back pretty far, breaking out 2006 hits you're glad to hear again (Chamillionaire's "Ridin'") or still want to forget (Jim Jones' "We Fly High"). But it all flows into one long Southern-rap champagne jam, with rock guitars (Shop Boyz' "Party Like a Rockstar," Lil Jon and Three 6 Mafia's "Act a Fool"), posse meetings (Birdman and Lil Wayne's "Stuntin' Like My Daddy," Lil Scrappy and Young Buck's "Money in the Bank"), moments of pure art (Unk's "2 Step") and, of course, kettledrums (Crime Mob's "Rock Yo Hips"). Dem Franchize Boyz' "Lean Wit It, Rock Wit It" gets the poetry prize ("Watch me make your face beat up my hands"), seconded by Mims ("I'm hot 'cause I'm fly, you ain't 'cause you not" — still amazing). It proves crunk is nowhere near dead — just devouring every other kind of music and mutating into new forms. Hips? Rocked.