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Jah Jr. – Back 2 Da Dub (Review)

Ever loved something so much that you could write a song about it? Emcee Jah Jr. loves his hometown of Dublin, GA so much that he decided to write his entire debut album, Back 2 Da Dub, about it. After moving to Charleston from Dublin 2 years ago, he heads home for a weekend and reflects on what life was like during his time living there, and thus, the album was born.

Throughout the album, Jah recruits familiar faces from his life to help him out via skits, and even gets an artist from Dublin to feature on a track. For a debut album, Jah Jr. makes an effort to check all of the boxes that he can, from having songs that showcase his lyricism, such as his intro song, “Back 2 Da Dub”, to visual storytelling in his song “Lately”, to songs that should ring off in the club like “1st” or “245”.

This effort is met with success in varying degrees. When listening to the second song, which is actually called “1st”, the production is a complete grand slam, but it’s met with a lesser quality performance from PLAYRANDY than we’re used to on the hook, who also provided the stellar production.

One of the most topically deep songs on the project, “Lately”, covers the relationship strain he felt with his parents as he grew older and they grew apart, amid his mother’s worsening alcoholism and his father’s infidelity. This lyrical depth goes to war with the most lifeless beat on the album, not making any jump from its singular loop. There are, however, some complete victories on the album, such as the song “Say Goodbye to My Soul”, which has stellar production, energy & lyricism and features Nory, who arguably runs away with the best verse on the whole album.

Overall, Back 2 Da Dub is worth the listen, with only a couple of songs that I would consider forgettable (“478” & “Coleman Court” in case you want to battle about it). The hardest thing about Back 2 Da Dub for me is convincing myself to care about Dublin, GA, a place that I’ve never been to and that I’ll never go to, as anyone who isn’t from GA and only knows about other places in GA in terms of how close to Atlanta they are. This is a solid effort in making that a reality and it’s easy to get caught in the wave of energy Jah Jr. provides as he moves through the songs.

Since this is my first album review for Extra Chill, I’ll give you guys a rundown of how I will score the album, on a 5-point scale as follows (lowest to highest):

No Chill
Lil’ Chill
Pretty Chill
Really Chill
Extra Chill

Back 2 Da Dub by Jah Jr. gets a Pretty Chill rating from me. The highs are especially high with the lows being especially low, but overall it’s a pretty middle of the road body of work with more “good” songs than “great” ones.

I definitely recommend you check it out and gauge it for yourself, you certainly won’t be disappointed. Listen below.