I Wish It Was The E.N.D.

I just have to say, that the Black Eyed Peas used to be good. They used to make well-written/well-constructed hip hop music. Now, not so much. “The E.N.D.” (The Energy Never Dies) is their latest CD, which, from every song I have heard, is a disgrace to the hip hop industry.

Don’t get me wrong, “I Gotta Feeling” and “Boom Boom Pow” are both extremely catchy (and maybe that's the goal??), but are they any good? No. Not at all.

Both songs utilize the auto-tune effect, which completely takes the singing aspect out of, well singing. “Boom Boom Pow” is especially bad, having not only horrible lyrics and the auto-tune mess, but having absolutely no background sound other than the muted bass and occasional snare drum.

And now, they recently released another single/video called “Imma Be”. I did not think that it could get any worse. But it did. Not only is “Imma Be” essentially another “Boom Boom Pow”, with even more auto-tune and repetition, but in their music video for it, they debate over a fake machine that has itself sing (rap/talk … whatever you want to say they do on their tracks now) for them so they don’t have to do any singing anymore. Fergie even makes a comment, “It takes the soul out of it,” while Will.I.Am counters with “you can’t say your futuristic and be scared of the future.” Well, interesting, considering, the group’s latest album has absolutely no soul in it whatsoever, and the auto-tune effect makes it so they barely have to sing anyway.

I know more people use the auto-tune than just the Peas, but it’s just really irritating to me for them to do it. Listen to Elephunk, their first album with Fergie. “Hands Up”, “Where is the Love”, “Hey Mama”, and of course “Let’s Get It Started” all sound a lot more well-crafted than anything on “The E.N.D.” I haven’t even mentioned their songs before Fergie, such as “Joints & Jam” and “Call/Request”, which are some of the best they have ever written.

Maybe the energy never dies, but the soul does.