Kool savas valezka der beste tag meines lebens

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So let's recap for a little moment. In 2002, people had already known Savas for quite some time. Be it in Westberlin Maskulin as basically the originator of the late 90s Berlin Battle Rap scene together with Taktloss, solo on his very hard-hitting and snappy but occasionally slightly confused EPs and mixtape or as a part of the widely respected and celebrated milestone-group MOR. No matter what he did or touched, people were always amazed by the sheer level of innovation and force he put into his music while he was experimenting with beats and style. He was the self-proclaimed and respected King of Rap, but he did not have a solo-album out yet. So, after a long time of working on a project and promising the world, he released Der beste Tag meines Lebens, an album widely regarded as one of, if not the best German Rap album of all time. People quote it to this day, you can find throwbacks to its style everywhere, this is the definition of a scene classic. So, how does it hold up today? Very weirdly, to be honest. Even if he would absolutely not say that ever, DBTML is basically Kool Savas' first step into actual wide-reaching commercialism, and, surprise surprise, it comes with a hefty dose of growing pains. But first let's get into the obvious positive point on this album, which is Savas himself. Having carefully curated potential songs for his debut for years at this point, of course you get the ones with the most impact performance-wise. Dude is absolutely on fire on here, spitting bar after bar after bar with no regards for anything else. He experiments with his flow and has super impressive but still rhythmically interesting doubletime-passages, his voice is even more forceful than ever and he just sounds so good on everything. He has a couple of features that were obviously childhood-dreams of his like Royce Da 5'9", Tre Little, A-Plus and Kurupt, his crew is on board with Valezka, Eko and Melbeatz herself, Azad shows up, and everyone sounds like they really, really wanted to be there. So many quotables, so many memorable moments, so much energy, so why doesn't it really click for me? It's the production. Simple as that. I already said once that in the early 00s, Melbeatz was basically the only producer capable on operating on an international level musically. That does not mean, however, that everything she touched turned into instant gold. The beats on here are trying to catch that magic middle-ground between Hardcore Hip-Hop and R'n'B-tinged Pop Rap, and I am not completely sure that she really had a plan how this should have played out. There's a lot of really chintzy pianos on here, thin synthesizers and hollow basstones playing off of legitimately hard-hitting drums, melodies that kind of go nowhere and clangy string-sounds. It hasn't aged well at all, and even at the time it wasn't the best sound out there. As usual, she's best when she makes something more snappy and aggressive, like on Gib Auf, the distorted bounce of Dunne or the string-heavy Don't Hate. Sometimes even the softer tracks can land, like the title track, but most of it sounds painfully dated even for its time, they did not really have an idea how to execute this sound, and... it's the beginning of Savas' R'n'B-flu (nothing against Valezka, of course, but these hooks will come back to haunt Savas later on). It's a couple of really middling beats with some high highs and weird lows (the flutes on Till' Ab Joe), and it's saved entirely by Savas being himself.

So yeah, this is a classic no discussion and no doubt, but that's thanks to Savas and not the beats. The production on here is dated to hell and back outside of some tracks, but Savas and his features are so engaged and on fire that I can't really care too much about that. Every time a beat pulls me out of it all, they come in and slap me back into place. In 2002, Hardcore Hip-Hop like this on such a professional level was still a novelty, and for a lot of people, this was the best sounding project Savas had had up until that point with some of his best performances to boot. It made it's undeniable impact, and I am not here to challenge that. Just, in hindsight you can see that nostalgia really overemphasizes just how "perfect" an album can be. This is a great project, and you can expect that, but if you go into this blind don't expect the level of perfection its fans would have you believe.

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  Kool Savas "Der beste Tag meines Lebens" (Official HQ Video) 2002

  3:58
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  Kool Savas - Der Beste Tag meines Lebens LIVE Saarbrücken 27.12.2012 HD Amateuraufnahme

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