Starting out as a freestyle rap battler in his native Philadelphia, Cassidy built his reputation on his solid battling skills. Not exactly the sort of rapper you’d expect to be releasing commercial cheese with R Kelly then?

The title, Split Personality, refers the three characters that represent Cassidy here – Cassidy, Tha Problem and B. Reese (the B. stands for Barry, Cassidy’s real name). Having the album essentially divided intothree subsections with an interlude introducing each of them makes for an easy reviewing experience. Describe the three personalities, the three styles and then draw some pictures, sorry I mean conclusions. Ready, shall we start?

First up is Cassidy who is definitely the most commercial personality of the trio, clearly aiming for chart hits with soft and inoffensive raps about nothing in particular. With that in mind it’s no surprise to find the, lyric biting, hit ‘Hotel’ in here alongside ‘Make U Scream’ featuring Snoop Dogg and ‘Get No Better’ with Mashonda adding some female R&B vocals for that added chart appeal.

After the commercial side is over he slips into personality number two - Tha Problem - for the track also titled ‘Tha Problem’ which unashamedly samples Public Enemy’s track ‘Terminator X To The Edge Of Panic’ from their 1988 album It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back but I guess if you’re going to sample your own genre then you the best place to start is with the unquestionable greats; and let’s face it, all musical genre’s consume themselves in some cannibalistic style or another. Remember ‘Shakermaker’ and ‘Whatever’ by Oasis, one had threats of a writ and the other resulted in an out of court settlement as both tracks were clearly not Noel Gallagher’s original work. But back to Tha Problem, this is the gritty street battling rapper all tough east posturing and rhymes. More guest spots ensue bringing in members of the Ruff Ryders whilst the beats on ‘Can I Talk To You’, featuring Jadakiss, come off like the Propellerheads playing at being James Bond again.

Lastly, there’s B. Reese, the conscious rapper so it’s all worthy subjects of substance and no guest artist, well aside from Mos Def and a handful of others – who does great conscious rhymes any more?

This whole multiple personality thing in hip-hop is nothing new, with the Wu Tang Clan and Hijack creating characters for themselves to play either on their records or live performances. The most recent and successful example would be the thoroughly wack D12.  Six rappers each with two personalities yet combined they have less skills than a solo Eminem record.

Cassidy seems to be using the three personalities to try to cover the entire hip-hop spectrum, the commercial, gritty and conscious. But tha problem with trying to please everyone is often you don’t really please anyone, and that is what Cassidy has done with me here.

Like Nas, 10 years ago, Cassidy is being touted as the future of east coast hip-hop. And like Nas and his debut, Illmatic, Cassidy threatens to mark out his spot in hip hop greatness and like Nas he fails to fully deliver the goods. Ten years on and Illmatic finds itself re-released and history has been kind, these days it’s hailed as a classic, and I know why, next to most contemporary hip-hop it is, but back in 94 it was strictly above average, no more. But that’s all Cassidy’s debut will ever be – average.
(2½/5)

Release date: 24 May 2004

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Split Personality