On Set in Stone, Rick Ross’s 12th album, the Magic City rap impresario deems himself the “Miami Martin Scorsese,” a bold, one might say outlandish, claim that nonetheless tracks with his penchant for over-the-top fiction. For 20 years, Rozay has refined a larger-than-life kingpin character, one that directs drug traffic and greenlights hits while anchored in Biscayne Bay, an iced champagne bucket always within reach. He’s created a deep mafioso mythology for himself that’s at odds with his reality as a former corrections officer turned fast food franchise and real estate mogul, but it’s never really seemed to matter. Ross has been a reliable purveyor of opulent vacation rap, excelling at the kind of empty-calorie singles that go down smooth and leave no real lasting impact. His best songs are a blast, a third margarita in the afternoon, the sonic equivalent of strolling through a city’s most expensive neighborhood thinking, “Yeah, I could live here.”
The problem is that he simply doesn’t know how to make a great album. 2010’s Teflon Don came the closest, and there have been many strong, enjoyable moments in his lengthy discography, but his full-lengths are always uneven. He’s one of those artists who works best on shuffle, good for soundtracking the immediate, front-facing satisfaction of doing deadlifts or throwing something on the grill. Every now and again, the music lights up pleasure centers in ways few other rappers can achieve; it’s easy to listen to songs like “Santorini Greece” or “Triple Beam Dreams” and wonder what a full album made with that kind of focus could sound like. Set in Stone, like all Rick Ross albums, has a few of those flashes of inspiration, but they’re offset by a sense of flailing, as though he’s unsure of how to mark his 20th year in the game and where to go next.
The Rozay hallmarks we’ve come to know—huge, expensive-sounding production; boasts of obscene wealth and unattainable lifestyles; that halting, syncopated delivery—appear in short bursts, most notably in the first three tracks. The opening suite feels like Ross identifying his strengths but scoping them from different angles. “Minks in Miami” casts his hustler template as an ’80s rock-the-bells anthem, enlisting Max B and French Montana to add to its blunt-force hype. The instrumental break on opener “Caviar Bumps” only lasts for the length of a verse, but it feels like it could go for an hour without getting old, creating an inviting, contemplative space that Ross doesn’t always play in. The T.I.-featuring “Mahogany Caskets” is the best of the three, a booming bar fest that pits Ross’s roomy flow against T.I.’s overstuffed twang, its beat hitting like a comet strike. Later, we get the exorbitant elegance of “Camel Meat” and the sparkling, neon-lit diptych of “Purple Fentanyl” and “#23.” None of these songs update or stretch Ross’s basic blueprint, but they feel welcome and familiar.
In between, Ross tries out a whole lot of ideas without a whole lot of success. He turns to Atlanta for inspiration, specifically the spacey 2010s trap sound, but attempts like “Ring Around the Rolls” and “Face Down” feel anonymous and overlong. Despite its competence, “Big Fish” comes off as a rote retread of the better tracks Ross and Gucci Mane have made together over the years, all by-the-numbers bravado without capturing the energy we know they’re capable of. He reunites with The-Dream for “City Lights,” a moody synth-pop jam that plays like a neutered version of the Weeknd. Then there are the egregious missteps: Despite Ross’ usually excellent ear, he chooses the chintziest, most Guitar-Center-demo-ass Casio groove for him and BigXthaPlug to rap over on “Living Large.” And “Porsche GT3 - RS” is just atrocious, as Ross squeaks out the last word of each bar à la Kendrick Lamar over a YouTube-type beat that doesn’t even bother trying to copy a famous producer. All of this makes the album feel more like a mixtape in progress, scraped together from features cut from other people’s projects. There’s the seed of a good record in there, but the Bawse is apparently too Big for an editor.
What makes Rick Ross fascinating is how he’s managed to stay successful despite being lapped by the zeitgeist. His style of silken luxury rap hasn’t been en vogue for years, but he’s managed to remain in the conversation primarily because of his dedication to it. It’s clear that he’s curious what the next chapter of the Rick Ross story will be, saying in interviews that Set in Stone offers a new perspective. But it’s unclear how his perspective has changed over the years: He’s rich, he’s been rich, he will forever be rich, and you, dear listener, are not. The waters are getting shallower, but the best moments here suggest he’s still got a little gas left in the yacht.
