Shad – The Old Prince Review

9 August 2008, Allan @ 5:15 pm Shad The Old Prince Review

Part of my look at potential candidates of the Polaris Music Prize, Shad is a rapper from London, Ontario. Not to make any offensive remarks but Shad’s The Old Prince was this year’s requirement to come from the “rap” genre.

I review next to very little hip-hop and I generally find myself being quite picky about things, I hate the typical rap about drugs, money and “girls”. I did grow up with a lot of avid hip-hop fans around me due to the location I live in but I always tended to be a guy that just liked something different for whatever reason.

Shadrach Kabango or simply Shad was born in Kenya and is of Rwandan descent. He attended Wilfrid Laurier (Waterloo) and has a business degree.

My first impressions of “The Old Prince” were quite positive. It starts off with an intro of a person discussing that prince’s aren’t supposed to be old even if he’s a good prince. Eventually or finally Shad starts spitting discussing all sorts of things from Quebec separatism, to gas prices to things regarding religion.

Shad is definitely quite talented as a rapper, he doesn’t have the most dance-able beats in the least bit but he shows you that he’s just as talented as anyone out there. I don’t care about having the beats anymore and I tend to search for a serious tone in my rap so this works conveniently for me. A lot of the time a piano is used or unconventional beats that one would find to rap over but Shad could just make an album over in complete silence and do some spoken poetry and he would probably win me over.

I don’t know what’s in store for Shad in the future, future financial success doesn’t always depend on improving and I really think this effort Shad gives it his all and it’s just whether or not other people find out about his stuff.

I definitely thought Cadence Weapon’s After Party Babies was going to be a lock on the shortlist but I agree that Shad’s The Old Prince is a superior album. Both albums don’t have those sexy beats people just seem to look for but the rapping is superb and that’s all that matters to me.

Only downside to me is that album takes on being thematic over the top and I don’t really see how it all fits in general in certain songs. I just want to enjoy his rapping, not worry about things being forced to connect to the album title.