If you are one of those people who enjoy beats over rhymes, then Trina’s sophomore album “Diamond Princess” is just for you.
Her first single “No Panties,” featuring Tweet, should have been a sign to the public right away that the album doesn’t have much to offer.
The cameos from artists like Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliot, Jagged Edge, Fabolous, Ludacris and Eve suggested this CD was going to be “tight”.
However, the intro with comedian Sommore (“Queens of Comedy,” “ComicView”) shouting out to all of the Nubian queens, housewives, chickenheads and busters made it clear that this album was a massacre waiting to happen.
The second track on the album “Hustling” opens up with Trina shouting “Hustler, I’m the queen of the South, tight with a cute face that’s what I’m about.”
Surely if Trina keeps spitting rhymes like these, “Hustling” is what she will be doing in the near future.
The album continues with the hit “Told Y’all” from the movie “All About the Benjamins” and then goes on to “Rewind That Back”.
On this track Trina gets a little help from close friend, Missy, who in the song says, “I’m hurting and scaring them like I took my panties off.” Hopefully Missy is just joking with that rhyme.
There is one song worth playing over- “B-R-Right” featuring Ludacris.
The song starts out with a voice chanting Angela Bassett’s Buddhist chant from the movie “What’s Love Got to Do With It.”
Trina and Ludacris echo each other in the hook with lyrics “I want my a- smacked, legs wide, front to back, side to side.” Although the song is a little raunchy it has an Indian beat that suggests belly dancing.
However, after all of the belly rolling and head bobbing from this song, Trina’s lyrical abilities on the remainder of the album don’t measure up to sophomore status.
On a song titled “U and Me,” Trina tries to get “street” and “hood” and come correct with rhymes, but it’s certainly not a track with creative, lyrical hip-hop rhymes.
In the song, Trina mentions how her rhymes are hip-hop quotable-but the hardest lyric she could come with was, “I used the strip club as a stepping stone, hit the stage, then got paid it wasn’t my second home.”
After that song, if the album isn’t already off because $15 has been wasted, you’ll get the chance to hear the song “Ladies 1st” featuring Eve.
Although the beat on the song sounds like another annoying Murder Inc. production, Trina definitely gets outshined by her cameo guest who unquestionably has the lyrical ability to make a follow-up album.
With 17 tracks Trina should have stopped after song No. 5, but she kept going.
In every song she felt the need to say she was a diamond princess, diamond diva, or better yet as she puts it, a diamond duchess.
Truly this album should have been titled “Cubic Zirconium Female.”
Kanisha Allen can be reached at
kenishaallen2000@yahoo.com.