Newsday
Shinoda's Show
"The Rising Tied" (Warner Bros.), the debut album from Linkin Park rapper Mike Shinoda's solo project, Fort Minor, is ambitious and well-constructed, powered by clear thoughts, crisp rhymes and rap-rock-friendly beats. It stumbles, like a lot of solo debuts, because it lacks the system of checks and balances that comes with being part of a band.
In Linkin Park, Shinoda is part of a three-pronged attack, offering the rap counterpoint to Chester Bennington's howls and Brad Delson's guitars' roars. In Fort Minor, he is the sole focus and sometimes being good is just not good enough.
His vision is strong on the first single "Believe Me," which boasts a bigger groove and a speedier flow than the rest of the album. It also feels most like a Linkin Park song, with his raps mixed with a sung chorus.
"Kenji," a moving tale about Japanese-Americans' time in internment camps during World War II, is another example of the full realization of Shinoda's ambitious plans. His smartest track is "Cigarettes," where he compares gangsta rap to smoking, "I'm running out to get the next rapper's CD, just sucking up the guns, drugs and misogyny."
At times, Shinoda's conscious-rap vibe gets to be a bit preachy and his anti-media rants get raised to Eminem-level paranoia. For the most part, though "The Rising Tied" shows that Shinoda has plenty to say and will only improve at finding better ways to say it.
