As we type this, Rick Ross' Teflon Don has only officially been available since whatever time your local music-selling store opened. The national press is already weighing in with reviews, though, and so far they're pretty positive. (Most of the music-buying and downloading public will probably choose to decide for themselves, but still.) Here are a few excerpts.
In the old Gray Lady herself, the New York Times, Surer Blood-loving scribe Jon Caramanica weighs in:
That someone would revive the memory of MC Hammer's glory days and use it as an enthusiastic metaphor for modern-day rap excess was inevitable. That it would happen on an album that also samples a Bobby Seale speech is unexpected. That the rapper who's pulled this off, and successfully at that, is Rick Ross is one of the great unlikely hip-hop success stories of the past decade.
"Teflon Don" is Rick Ross's fourth solo album, and the one that establishes him as one of rap's most potent and creative forces. He's a ferocious character, an impressive rapper and, as heard on this strong album, a clever and loose thinker, willing to try out new poses.
In the unlikely outlet of the Washington Post, Sean Fennessey writes:
At just 11 songs, "Teflon Don" is Ross's slimmest and also strongest album. His goals remain the same: acquire wealth, explain wealth. But his word choice and onomatopoetic gestures ("Money machines, yeah, they r-r-r-ring like a mobile phone!") are unmatched in rap right now.
In the L.A. Times, Jeff Weiss breaks out the SAT words:
Paramnesia refers to a cranial condition in which memory is distorted and fantasy and objective experience are confused. Judging from Rick Ross' career trajectory, this is one of his greatest assets....
His chimerical mythologizing is as stubbornly entertaining as anything James Cameron could cook up, but Ross also reveals an endearing peek behind the platinum curtain....
Sonically, the album is beautifully constructed, with West, No I.D., the Inkredibles and the J.U.S.T.I.C.E League creating a symphonic grandeur to match Ross' elaborate delusions.
One of the best summer blockbusters in recent memory, "Teflon Don" proves how thin the line is between a flight of fancy and something fantastic.
Translation: He really, really likes it.
Finally, Allhiphop has an exhaustive, track-by-track review, but here's the general gist of it:
Ross's Teflon Don solidifies the Miami rapper as a force that musical rivals will have to contend with. Emphasis stays with musical, because we're talking about good music and albums we want to listen to for years to come, right? Teflon Don is the culmination of a lot of already classic videos, loose songs and savvy street marketing. So, the album is really a part of an entire movement that quietly encompasses marketing as well as music. The results are pretty damn epic.
