This is his album’s sixth single? Christ, that’s even more than Jagged Little Pill…

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[6.88]

Hazel Robinson: Oh look, it’s a retroid hip hop summer sampling. I still really like this sound, though, and Jeezy works it pretty well; it’s nothing new, variations on the old theme of “I’m still down” and a chipmunked sample, but it’s one of those things that ain’t broke.
[7]

Jonathan Bradley: Raise a glass to all those critics disparaging Jeezy’s lyrics. Congratulations, assholes. Thanks to you, Mr. 17-5 had to try to step his wordplay up, resulting in this gem: “Just like the glass I know he sees right through me/Transparent, I can’t hide my window pane.” Bra-fucking-vo. Jeezy’s discovered the pun. Other fun facts: Jeezy’s a big fan of early Jay-Z. Such a big fan he has to go shoehorn half the tracklist of Reasonable Doubt into his third verse, before he goes and mentions In My Lifetime which makes no sense, because that was Hov’s sophomore album. Is Jeezy’s poor knowledge of rap history meant to be proof of his “I don’t like rappers” bit on “Gangsta Music”? So, yes, here Jeezy has even more cringe-worthy rhymes than his lyrics have ounces of cocaine, but there’s nothing cringe-worthy about the grand drama and bitter regret with which he invests “Don’t Do It.” Telling an incarcerated comrade to keep his chin up (oh, and by the way, don’t snitch on Our hero), he eschews the detailed storytelling of the classic of this genre, Nas’ “One Love”, in favor of squeezing wrenching pathos from simple couplets like “I’m thinking what to say to make him have a better day/Walking down this long hall, thinking, what the fuck I’m gonna say.” The Willie Hutch sample weeps behind him, and Jeezy’s grainy voice paints an elaborate tale of tantalizing and all-too-fleeting luxury.
[9]

Trey Kerby: When adding southern drums to what sounds like a rejected Blueprint track, it’s common courtesy to shout out Jay in verse. I’m still not sure if it’s to the song’s benefit or detriment that there’s only about a 24 bars of actual rapping.
[4]

Alex Macpherson: One of the finest cuts from one of last year’s best albums, “Don’t Do It” is where Jeezy amps everything up as high as possible. The beat, courtesy of DJ Pain 1, is immense: lavish strings surge while soulful backing vocals plead and keen, raising the emotional stakes ever higher. Jeezy proves himself more than a match, letting his gruff vowels boom and roll out like a surfer riding a wave; it’s easy to be swept along, to let yourself be overwhelmed by the sheer opulence of it all. What with the presidential beat and the combination of empathy, rhetoric and promises, one pictures Jeezy as a politician delivering some stirring oratory to his crowd, perhaps from a balcony – and then, at the close of the second verse, he reveals “Don’t Do It” to indeed be his own “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” with the line, “You must love me – I told y’all, in due time the city is mine.”
[10]

Martin Skidmore: I really like his hoarse voice and the sound of something close to desperation in his tones, though his flow occasionally sounds a touch awkward. I like the old soul backing on this – reminds me a bit of some of Ghostface’s best. The lyrics are moving, raw and original when they are about a friend in prison, less strong on the last verse when he is bragging; but even then, he says it in new ways.
[9]

Martin Kavka: Is his always-behind-the-beat flow avant-garde, or just lame?
[3]

Ian Mathers: The post-Ghostface, plush production on “Don’t Do It” is gorgeous, but Tony Starks would find something more compelling to talk about over it than another homie gone to jail (or at least, he’d find a more interesting and vivid way to talk about it). This might possibly be because he doesn’t give a fuck anymore, whereas you can practically smell the flop sweat coming off of Young Jeezy.
[5]

Jordan Sargent: For a song that’s a sixth single and buried in the last fourth of an 18 track album, “Don’t Do It” is surprisingly fascinating. Jeezy has made his name not by rapping to the hood but by rapping for them, and by being above all — even more than an artist — an inspiration. It doesn’t make his music great — that would be the presence, the ad-libs, the punchlines and the hooks — but it’s what makes his music feel like there is something more at stake than just what’s coming out of the speakers. On “Don’t Do It”, the conceit is flipped — Jeezy is looking back for strength, and he finds it in the form of the beat, a soulful and sorrowful composition with a cooing sample that sounds like it was made for Freeway, one of his closest contemporaries. He raps about visiting a locked up friend in jail, and in the last line of the first verse he relays something the friend said to him: “Keep doin’ what you doin’, hold us real niggas down/ No matter what you do, don’t let us real niggas down”. And there we find the inspiration for the thug who named his first album Thug Motivation 101, and whose last album was by far the most important rap album of 2009, whether critics realized it or not.
[8]