Ace Hood – Hustle Hard
And now for the all too rare phonetics-based hip-hop critique…
[Video][Website]
[5.38]
Hazel Robinson: He’s too low in the mix, too blurred, not harsh enough, too repetitive. Hustle, as a word, is too sibilant to work for a tough chorus; the repeating words that are such tropes don’t give them the song’s full effect and takes any teeth it was sprouting right out.
[4]
Al Shipley: Ace Hood has always had a little hint of a sneering wit that’s easy to overlook when he’s being shouted down by DJ Khaled and surrounded by bigger stars. It almost comes through here, but this time that shrill, lurching Lex Luger beat gets in his way.
[3]
Ian Mathers: While’s certainly treading familiar ground here, Hood does two crucial things a little better than most of his peers: he grounds “hustle” in a particular socioeconomic context (that is, he’s not just hustling for status symbols), and he really makes you feel the effort he’s putting out there. A lot of rappers talk about hustling hard, but most of them sound a hell of a lot more laid back than “Hustle Hard” does.
[7]
Chuck Eddy: Pete Rose hip-hop, hustling fairly easily-not-hard itself (which helps), and justifying its existence ethically since his baby needs a new pair of shoes.
[7]
Alfred Soto: His flow above average, with beats any young dickhead can program, this pretender nevertheless manages the difficult trick of sounding least convincing about his Mercedes and most when reminding us his mom needs a house and baby needs shoes. Also, it’s not a second longer than necessary.
[6]
Zach Lyon: It’s the video that really opened this up for me, if only because it uses an interesting color palette and features Ace Hood performing with way too much energy. Before I watched it, “Hustle Hard” left me with nothing more than a bland mental image of Rick Ross sitting in a dark room with a cigar, which I think is actually every single Rick Ross album cover. And Lex Luger is one of my least-favorite big name producers, but this beat has a surprising level of depth (or perhaps just reverb) that gives it some replayability. Ace still does little to make himself stand out vocally or lyrically, and the remix is quite necessary.
[6]
Jer Fairall: Comes off as sonically and lyrically thin at first, but “closed mouths don’t get fed on this boulevard” lands a particularly harsh blow, and the cycling horror movie synth-strings slowly insinuate themselves into the brain. I end up leaving this track wishing there was just a bit more to it, but as a slice of street life it’s appropriately direct and unsentimental.
[7]
Michaela Drapes: I hate it when I hear this one coming out of cars driving by on the avenue. And I hear it a lot. I get why it’s appealing, but it’s about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the back of the skull. We get it Ace, you, me, everybody — we all need to hustle hard. THANKS FOR THE MEMO.
[3]