Previous experiences with the music of "Sean da Paul" were less than stellar, and his latest album, "The Trinity," is no different.
"The Trinity" plays pretty much the way you would expect a Sean Paul album to - it makes a person feels as though they have been kidnapped by a crew of tropical pirates and whisked away to a reggaeton dance club floor somewhere in the Caribbean Sea. In fact, the reggae feel of the album gives one an irrational desire to blend up a margarita and throw "Pirates of the Caribbean" in the DVD player.
However, the feeling wears off rather quickly after hearing the first three tracks of the album, which are so similar it is nigh impossible to differentiate them. The similarity between tracks is a persistent issue that permeates the entire album - in fact, at some points, if the CD player skipped and changed songs, the discontinuity wouldn't be realized until after the fact.
If variety is the spice of life, consider Sean Paul's salsa to be extremely mild. Simply put, his song productions are begging for some variety.
It also has been considerably difficult to understand what Sean Paul is saying on his tracks. At times, his unintelligible gibbering is more confusing than the oral comprehension part of a Spanish test.
One of the album's highlights includes "Ever Blazing," a track that could be a thinly-veiled reference to the many wondrous joys of marijuana in the guise of a love ballad in which Sean Paul reaffirms his love ad nauseum.
In the tradition of "Get Busy," a radio-play single from his previous album, "Dutty Rock," Sean Paul has another subtly carnal entreaty to ladies everywhere in one of the album's true club bangers, "Temperature." After crafting such lyrical gems as, "Well woman the way the time cold I wanna be keepin' you warm / I got the right temperature to shelter you from the storm / Oh lord, gal I got the right tactics to turn you on, and girl I / Wanna be the Papa ... You can be the Mom," Paul proves himself to be the biggest lyrical monster in hip-hop this side of Young Jeezy.
The Caribbean musical maestro also manages to wax nostalgic about lost friends (presumably the tragic victims of an unfortunate dance-floor mishap) on the track "Never Gonna Be the Same."
"The Trinity" is not a terribly good album, nor is it entirely deserving of a rating of zero shamrocks. Worse, it is a middling album, anonymous in its mediocrity.