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J DILLA
The Shining
BBE
***

While Detroit hip-hop producer James "J Dilla" Yancey's last couple of years were beset by health problems, he still produced beats whenever the opportunities arose. Even while hospitalised for the lupus and kidney failure that eventually caused his death, the beatsmith would work away on a portable sound system. As a result, there's a string of unreleased tracks in the vaults, so even more posthumous albums can be expected. Here, Dilla's soulful loops and dramatic strings act as soundbeds for an array of MCs, and it was left to Detroit jazz drummer Karriem Riggins to provide the finishing production touches. But, for every lush, slow-motion ballad (So Far to Go with Common and D'Angelo) there's Geek Down with Busta Rhymes shouting the odds about, well, nothing at all. Unlike Donuts, the album released shortly before Yancey's death earlier this year, there's little cohesion and only occasional flashes of genius on show. No doubt J Dilla himself would have finished the job rather differently. www.jdilla.org - Jim Carroll