''Survival Skills'' is a collaborative studio album by American rappers KRS-One and
Buckshot
A shotgun shell, shotshell or simply shell is a type of rimmed, cylindrical (straight-walled) cartridges used specifically in shotguns, and is typically loaded with numerous small, pellet-like spherical sub-projectiles called shot, fired thro ...
. It was released on September 15, 2009 through Duck Down Music.
Production
Production may refer to:
Economics and business
* Production (economics)
* Production, the act of manufacturing goods
* Production, in the outline of industrial organization, the act of making products (goods and services)
* Production as a stati ...
was handled by
Illmind
Ramon Ibanga, Jr. (born August 28, 1980), known professionally as Illmind (often stylized as !llmind), is an American record producer, songwriter, and educator. As of 2012, he lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Illmind has co-written and produced hip ...
Khrysis
Christopher Frederick Tyson (born September 7, 1981), better known as Khrysis, is an American hip hop producer and half of the duo The Away Team.
Khrysis' productions consist of samples of records with intricate melodies and diverse drum bea ...
Nottz
Dominick J. Lamb, (born February 21, 1977) better known by his stage name Nottz (or Nottz Raw), is an American hip hop record producer and rapper from Norfolk, Virginia. Nottz has produced for some of the biggest names in hip hop, including Bu ...
. It features guest appearances from
Bounty Killer
Rodney Basil Price (born 12 June 1972), known as Bounty Killer, is a Jamaican reggae and dancehall deejay. AllMusic describes him as "one of the most aggressive dancehall stars of the '90s, a street-tough rude boy with an unrepentant flair f ...
,
Heltah Skeltah
Heltah Skeltah was an American hip hop duo which consisted of rappers Jahmal "Rock" Bush and Sean "Ruck" Price. The two were also members of New York supergroup Boot Camp Clik, along with Buckshot, Smif-N-Wessun and O.G.C.
Biography
He ...
,
Immortal Technique
Felipe Andres Coronel (born February 19, 1978), better known by the stage name Immortal Technique, is an American rapper. Most of his lyrics focus on controversial issues in global politics, from a radical left-wing perspective.
Immortal Techn ...
,
K'naan
Keinan Abdi Warsame (born 1 February 1978) ( so, Keynaan Cabdi Warsame, ar, كَينَان عَبدِ وَرسَمَ ''Kaynān ʿAbdi Warsama''), better known by his stage name K'naan (), is a Somali Canadians, Somali-Canadian musician. He ...
,
Mary J. Blige
Mary Jane Blige ( ; born January 11, 1971) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Often referred to as the " Queen of Hip-Hop Soul" and " Queen of R&B", Blige has won nine Grammy Awards, a Primetime Emmy Award, four American Music Award ...
,
Melanie Fiona
Melanie Fiona Hallim (born July 4, 1983) is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario.Naledge
Jabari Miles Evans, better known by his stage name Naledge, is an American rapper and one half of the hip-hop group Kidz in the Hall. He is also an assistant professor of Race and Media at the University of South Carolina in School of Journalism ...
,
Pharoahe Monch
Troy Donald Jamerson (born October 31, 1972), better known by his stage name Pharoahe Monch, is an American rapper from South Jamaica, Queens, New York. He is known for his complex lyrics, intricate delivery, and internal and multisyllabic rhy ...
Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli Greene (; born October 3, 1975) is an American rapper. He earned recognition early on through his collaboration with fellow Brooklyn rapper Mos Def in 1997, when they formed the group Black Star. Kweli's musical career continued with ...
, the Loudmouf Choir and DJ Revolution.
The album peaked at number 62 on the ''Billboard'' 200, number 19 on the
Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums
Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a music chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine that ranks R&B and hip hop albums based on sales in the United States and is compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. The chart debuted as Hot R&B LPs in the issue dated ...
, number 11 on the
Top Rap Albums
Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a music chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine that ranks R&B and hip hop albums based on sales in the United States and is compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. The chart debuted as Hot R&B LPs in the issue dated ...
and number 9 on the Independent Albums, with selling around 8,500 copies its first week in the United States.
The
lead single
A lead single (also known as a debut single) is the first single to be released from a studio album by an artist or a band, usually before the album itself is released and also occasionally on the same day of the album's release date.
Release s ...
, "Robot", was released on May 5, 2009, and accompaying
music video
A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device ...
, directed by
Todd Angkasuwan
Todd Angkasuwan is a Thai-American music video and documentary film director.
Biography
Angkasuwan grew up in Riverside, California and has been making films since he was 9 years old.
, debuted as the ''New Joint of the Day'' on
106 & Park
''106 & Park'' is an American hip hop and R&B music video show, set up in a countdown format, that was broadcast on weekdays at 6:00 pm ET/5:00 pm CT on BET; it aired on a one-day delay on BET International. It was the network's highest- rate ...
on September 4, 2009.
Critical reception
''Survival Skills'' was met with generally favorable reviews. At
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...
, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an
average
In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7 ...
score of 67, based on eight reviews.
Steve Juon of RapReviews praised the album with a flawless 10 out of 10, claiming "Buckshot and KRS have achieved something rather remarkable here - an album I can't find a single fault with. There's not a bad beat, there's not a whack rhyme, there's not a collaborator on a track that missed the mark, and the disc itself is neither too short nor too long".
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...
's David Jeffries stated that "loyal hip-hop heads with a taste for the old-school
boom bap
Boom bap is a subgenre and music production style that was prominent in the East Coast during the golden age of hip hop from the late 1980s to the early 1990s.
The term "boom bap" is an onomatopoeia that represents the sounds used for the b ...
shouldn't think twice and won't be disappointed". ''Prefix Magazine'' reviewer called it "a call to arms, and a poetic, uncompromising one at that".
In a mixed review, Andrew Rennie of
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...
-based ''
Now
Now most commonly refers
to the present time.
Now, NOW, or The Now may also refer to:
Organizations
* Natal Organisation of Women, a South African women's organization
* National Organization for Women, an American feminist organization
* Now ...
'' said, "KRS-One's wordplay remains clever and topical, especially on the anti-Auto-Tune anthem "Robot", while his sanctimoniousness has been toned down to more tolerable levels.
Black Moon Black Moon may refer to:
* Black moon, one of four astronomical events involving new or dark moons
* Black Moon (person) (c. 1821–1893), Lakota (American Indian) headman
* Black Moon or Lilith (hypothetical moon), a hypothetical natural satelli ...
's Buckshot is a comfortable pairing and, although his street-savvy sound may not have aged as well as some of his Duck Down Records brethren's, he still finds a familiar dynamic when rapping alongside old cohorts". Writing for '' Spin'', Mosi Reeves stated that "the beats by producers Black Milk, 9th Wonder and Havoc are strictly no-frills, but just hot enough to keep these cranky yet lovable old MCs' joints from stiffening up". Quentin B. Huff of ''
PopMatters
''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, fi ...
'' reviewed, "Ultimately, ''Survival Skills'' does what its creators intended for it to do: to be resolute in its dedication to lyrical acumen and head nodding production. Had they also been more adventurous with the content, the album would have risen to another level". Jesse Serwer of '' XXL'' said, "KRS and Buck might have first left Timberland-shaped footprints on hip-hop in the ’80s and early ’90s, respectively, but, on their first collaborative effort, they prove that not much has changed, and it truly is survival of the fittest".
In a negative review, Tom Breihan of ''
Pitchfork
A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves.
The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...
'' wrote, "to catch a glimpse of these guys' past glories in 2009, your best option is still to go see them live; this is just a souvenir".
In his ''Consumer Guide'', veteran music critic Robert Christgau gave the album a one-star honorable mention, saying it was "basically an old-school mixtape, wiser when it instructs the fathers than when it criticizes the sons"; he also picked its two songs "Think of All the Things" and "Runnin' Away".