Missy Elliot:
The Cook Book

Release Date: 4 July 2005

Reviewed By: Melisa Tang

1. Joy feat Mike Jones

2. Party Time

3. Irresistible Delicious feat Slick Rick

4. Lose Control feat Fatman Scoop & Ciara

5. My Struggles feat Mary J Blige & Grand Puba

6. Melt Down

7. The Right One For Me

8. On & On feat Pharrell Williams

9. We Run This

10. Time & Time Again

11. Gotta Move On feat Tweet

12. Mommy

13. 4 My Man

14. Teary Eyed

15. Smash This Place

16. Juicy

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If you were to name the best female rappers of all time in the hip hop game, Missy Elliott would always make the cut. Although her work has not always been as consistent as it should have been, (peep 'This Is Not A Test' for a prime example), Missy always manages to deliver hot singles, and this time around was no different.  

The album's jump off single was the UK top ten hit 'Lose Control' featuring Ciara and Fatman Scoop, which admitedly took a while for me to get used to. This is probably one of the most "out there" tracks Missy has done in a long, long time, sampling an old House/Techno beat from Eighties group Cybotron. Fatman Scoop's presence doesn't appear to have much of an effect on the song - if anything, he's the only bad part of the song!  

Missy has made a distinct move away from the usual Timbaland production which we have seen on her previous albums, although the beat master does make two contributions to the album in the form of 'Joy' and 'Partytime'. Both these joints are worth checking out, particularly 'Joy', which has a stripped down, hollow beat backing a relaxed Missy. New rapper Mike Jones makes a welcome appearance alongside Missy on this opening cut, holding it down well for the Mid-West. 'Partytime' is an average attempt at a club banger, but it lacks that uniqueness that Missy and Timb usually bring to their club joints. Missy's lyrics will keep you entertained though, with lines like, 'Forget about it like the world forgot Sisqo!' 

There are several tracks which are of the high standard we have come to expect from the one they call Missy, and these include: The Neptunes' produced 'On & On', a track which takes it back to the old skool with all the scratching and mixing; the emotional 'My Struggles', featuring Grand Puba and the one and only Mary J. Blige, who sounds comfortable in her rhyming skills; and 'Irresistible Delicious' which features Slick Rick and sees Missy switch it up on two of his old hits, 'Treat Her Like A Prostitute' and 'Lick The Balls'. 

Missy appears to be more than capable of producing an album without Timbaland's help, but the album does trail off after the Rich Harrison produced 'Can't Stop', a combination of Beyonce's 'Crazy In Love' and Amerie's '1 Thing', both of which were courtesy of Harrison. This track would do really well if released as a single, and would definitely do Missy's reputation as hip hop's finest female emcee no harm.  

It's when Missy turns to do R&B slow jams and ballads that the Virginia native fails to tickle our fancy. Tracks like '4 My Man' featuring Fantasia and 'Time And Time Again' can only be described as bland, whilst her collaboration with hot producer Scott Storch on 'Meltdown' is anything less than scorching. Instead of sounding fresh and innovative, the song comes across as sounding rather boring, with Missy voicing her love of the 'magic stick' a little too often for my liking. A few mentions too many and it becomes tiring, as if she's trying to prove something, (maybe not surprising though, as rumours of her sexuality continue to run rife).  

Whilst Missy continues to experiment with other music genres, her skills as a producer, songwriter and artist can only improve, but there are some things she should steer well clear of: namely fake accents, as her Jamaican patois is a little painful to listen to! Nevertheless, 'The Cookbook' has seen Missy take another step towards full independence. She no longer needs to rely on Timbaland for hit records, but a couple more collabos with Tim on 'The Cookbook' wouldn't have hurt. To some degree we miss Mr Mosley's beat making, but on the other hand, it's refreshing and assuring to see Missy do practically a whole album on her own. This may be her sixth album to date, but as 'The Cookbook' has shown, Missy is only now ready to step into the limelight all on her own. You go girl! 

Rating: 4 out of 5 

Top 3 tracks:

3) Irresistible Delicious

5) My Struggles

7) On & On

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