Album Review: J. Cole - The Off-Season

It has been a long three-year wait for J. Cole fans and Hip Hop Fans alike for J Cole's new album “The Off-Season”. This comes after J Cole's documentary release along with a freestyle on La Leakers that will most likely go down in history. The rollout from J. Coles team for this album has been brilliant, but has this lived up to the hype?

J Cole opens with “95 South” where J. Cole calls out the whole game and says how easy it is now, this song was an electric opening to his album with clever production sampling and throwing back to his roots. The energy just picks up all over again with “My Life” which features the smooth harmonies of Morray and 21 Savage shutting it down with his verse which does sound similar to their song together “A Lot”.

“Punchin the Clock” sounds like it came in a parcel straight from Brooklyn New York which shows J Cole can really jump on any type of production and work his magic, “100 mil” J Cole turns the album into overdrive with wordplay on Drake's lyrics where J. Cole said “Don’t care if it’s Michael B. Jordan that’s calling my woman to f***, she ain’t gon’ never pick up”. This isn’t the last time we hear references to Drizzy in this album with “Hunger on Hillside” where J Cole states “You hittin' them weights, congratulations 'cause you built somethin' , You takin' a lot of boxin' lessons, but you still pu**y”. We love a good album, but do we love a potential beef with two huge artists coming out of it? Big Yes.

J. Cole has done it again, J. Cole has come back harder and brought class production along with some of the most clever wordplay you will hear in rap now, the question is, is his next album “The Fall Off” the last we see from him?

Reviewed by: Aidan Treston