Alchemist has blessed some of rap’s elite with beats that are still imprinted in many brains like fingerprints in a cop shop. The Cali native made sure when he got into the game back in the early nineties that he stayed current and pushed his product to the appropriate chain of demand, most of which still look for his presence on their albums thirteen years later.

After his dope First Infantry project was received with nothing but praise, critics and fans alike often expect follow ups to be just as impressive and unfortunately it might not necessarily happen that way. The Chemistry Files is an example of this, but we are not reading this as a comparison, so moving steadily along The Chemistry Files incorporates some of Hip-hops most current with appearances from the usual; Mobb Deep and their boy 40 Glocc, Cypress Hill’s B Real, New York staples Cam’ Ron, AZ, and Tony Yayo – most of whose tracks come and go without encouraging the listener to hear again.

The hardest and most memorable track on this album for me is from the legendary Southern icon Scarface and The Product, “G Type,” which showed up on the first part of My Homies – but this doesn’t really have the strength to carry the album on its own. However, after Alchemist’s boy Eminem opens the project, talking about his homie’s injuries from a bus accident, Al himself launches into “Reppin ALC.” Its a pretty solid production where the man himself does some self promotion and convinces us that regardless of what we may have heard, he is still with us in both beat and rhyme.

But the hot tracks like the aforementioned and the hot production on Shady artist’s Bobby Creekwater’s “All I Do” are tainted by lackluster performances. The project has a rushed feel and even with the weight Al himself carries and the majority of the artists that come through to add their respective rhymes to his, “The Chemistry Files” just fails to hit the spot. No matter how much Alchemist will be one of the most ingenious producers of this rap shit, he needs to think wisely before putting out a project that has the capabilities of making you go ‘WTF?’

Perhaps putting out this project as an instrumental album may have given it wider critical acclaim as Alchemist will always produce the beats that make you go hmmm, however stronger verses are required along with just some thought into what you are repping your name with.