Good Morning Vietnam

Check out this surprisingly uplifting track from Saigon's long-delayed and highly anticipated debut (!) studio album. It's hard to believe that the rapper who was introduced to much of the listening public through Turtle on Entourage back in 2005 has only now gotten his act together enough to release this much-hyped record. "Clap" is the first track I've heard off the album, which came out just after Valentine's Day, and I've been digging its triumphantly bouncy beat, perhaps a reflection of the artist's own joy at finally getting his music out there for the world to hear.

The song was produced by Just Blaze, who delivers a solid track. Of course, he's working with some great source material: Lamont Dozier's 1976 baby-making anthem "Let Me Make Love to You" is heavily sampled. The swelling strings and keys are also reminiscent of some more recent hip-hop offerings: Young Jeezy's "Go Crazy" (prod. by DJ Cannon) and Kanye's "Touch the Sky," both of which are themselves built around '70s samples from soul god Curtis Mayfield.

Obviously the use of a '70s sample and a showy R&B chorus isn't exactly uncharted territory in hip-hop production. That said, having the Notorious B.I.G.'s widow Faith Evans sing your choruses is a pretty legit way for a Brooklyn rapper to establish his street cred (Saigon is not actually from Ho Chi Minh City, but from a war zone of a different sort known as Brownsville). Gospel influences shine throughout (the singer's name is Faith, after all), and I'm pretty sure I even heard a "hallelujah" in there somewhere.

Saigon - Clap


I haven't heard the whole album, but my sense is that the positivity found on "Clap" isn't necessarily the record's dominant theme - not that surprising for a guy whose album release was delayed for 6 years by a variety of incidents including weapons charges (a knife) and getting stabbed in the head (gotta watch out for those knives). Still, this is a great track to lead with, if for nothing more than the catharsis it expresses at the release of an album that was a long time coming. Dig it.