Dreams Worth More Than Money

Dividing his sophomore effort between weighty, radio-aimed numbers and loud, Gucci Mane-styled party tracks, Meek Mill is a fine ringleader on his 2015 LP, his first since 2012's Dreams and Nightmares and his first since becoming Nicki Minaj's romantic interest. That latter bit brought the rapper a significant amount of public pressure as the semi-secret relationship lit up all the hip-hop gossip pages. Still, the unfettered Dreams Worth More Than Money swaggers with the utmost confidence, ferociously declaring its reckless supremacy during the Rick Ross feature "Been That" ("Just me and Junior in the Brinks truck/Doing all this shit we can think of"). Chris Brown joins for the highlight "All Eyes on You," a fictional and fun recounting of Mill and Minaj's first meeting where Meek claims he didn't even know the diva's name. Minaj appears on the woozy "Bad for You," offering a simple and sensual chorus that's right in line with the most revealing moments of her 2014 album The Pinkprint. Raw banger "Ambitionz" sits next to the utterly plush "Pullin' Up" with the Weeknd, and yet this variety show is still easy to navigate, acting like a Fast and Furious soundtrack with folks like Drake, Swizz Beatz, and Diddy dropping by, all carrying their prime material. In the end, the street-worthy effort seems more influenced by Maybach Music than Minaj, as it forsakes the paparazzi and gossip pages for the better and continues on the path first laid out on the man's mixtapes. ~ David Jeffries