‘Still Rollin’ is the debut studio album of the controversial Punjabi singer and rapper, Shubhneet Singh aka Shubh. The album comes in the wake of his miraculous rise to fame thanks to the immense national and international success of singles like ‘No Love’ and ‘Baller’.
Establishing his prodigy status early in the career, Shubh is in line to become one of if not the biggest artist of the country. He has taken the baton from the likes of Sidhu Moosewala and Karan Aujla and has been carrying the legacy of Punjabi pop and hip-hop forward in full force. The album carries grand new school sonics fused with his west coast influenced style of rapping and singing.
The international chart topper starts off the album with the title track ‘Still Rollin’, sequel to his hit debut single ‘We Rollin’ announcing that he’s back with the same vigour he started out with. The track sees him boasting about his gangster lifestyle full of cars, guns and homeboys in order to woo his love interest. An infectious hook and some great rhymes make it a major highlight of the album.
What follows is another braggadocio trap banger ‘Ice’ produced by Lavish Dhiman (also seen on Still Rollin and Dior). The song and the whole album is a testament to the fact Shubh has cracked the code to make ear worm hooks and compositions. This 808 heavy track is car music at its finest.
‘Cheques’ and ‘OG’ adhere to the same pattern of songwriting and structuring as seen in the previous two tracks and the songs would have worked well as singles but this repetitiveness takes away from their impact in an album setting. Just as the project starts getting weary Shubh and Karan Kanchan decide to switch things up with ‘Ruthless’. We witness the rapper at his lyrical peak as he delivers quotables after quotables. The verses are heightened by a ruthless beat along with his daunting delivery and flows.
It’s a shame that a stellar performance like this is followed up by uninspired filler tracks like ‘Dior’ and ‘The Flow’ which end the album at a sour note. Even though his melodies and compositions are a fresh take on the traditional Punjabi pop rap which separate him from the huge lot of similar musicians, most of the tracks in here feel like futile attempts to recreate the magic of his early singles.
The project puts a dent on the popstar’s spotless run of singles as he struggles to find his footing as a project maker. Even in a short runtime of 21 minutes, it has it’s fair share of cracks and inadequacies. What is branded as an album seems more like an collection of formulaic singles clubbed together as an afterthought.
