“Murder Reigns” alludes to the fallout caused by absentee dads (“Papa didn’t show me so the streets raised me”). “The Warning” begins with a prayer in Christ’s name, but …
The petition is followed by typical gangsta gunk proving that this rapper is no saint (“Watch me cock back and unload/Bullets goin’ through the chest and out the back”). Similar thug violence appears on “The Pledge (Remix),” “Connected” and “Pop N—-s.” There’s bragging, obscenities and crude anatomical slang. Sexual conquests—served up in graphic detail—reduce women to erotic playthings (“Pop N—-s” boasts taking “16 at a time”). Elected president of the united ghettos of “Emerica,” Ja Rule talks of cutting taxes for strippers and gangstaz, and tells his subjects, “Go on sell ya drugs … It’s all good.” Tracks glamorize drunkenness and being high. “Murder Reigns” uses a dangerous blend of drugs and alcohol to form an analogy (“Whiskey with Jamaican rum, you get [rapper] Biggie [Smalls]/Mix gin with a little cocaine, you got me”).
Rapper/actor Ja Rule (he co-stars in the new-to-video Half Past Dead) is spiritually confused—a self-proclaimed savior eager to claim holiness, mete out judgment, indulge in drugs and sex, then turn around and seek forgiveness so he can do it all again. His religion becomes an artistic device. Don’t let teens give in to The Last Temptation.
