Duets: The Final Chapter

1	B.I.G. Live in Jamaica (Intro) / Nelly Live 1:22
2	It Has Been Said / Obie Trice 3:18
3	Spit Your Game / Twista 4:09
4	Whatchu Want / Jagged Edge 3:54
5	Get Your Grind On / Big Pun 5:24
6	Living the Life / Cheri Dennis 4:28
7	The Greatest Rapper (Interlude) 0:08
8	1970 Somethin' / The Game 3:25
9	Nasty Girl / Avery Storm 4:46
10	Living in Pain / Mary J. Blige 4:01
11	I'm with Whateva / Jim Jones 2:33
12	Beef 4:57
13	My Dad (Interlude) 0:10
14	Hustler's Story / Big Gee 5:47
15	Breakin' Old Habits / T.I. 4:36
16	Ultimate Rush / Missy Elliott 3:48
17	Mi Casa / Jim Jones 4:12
18	Little Homie (Interlude) 0:34
19	Hold Ya Head / Juelz Santana 2:45
20	Just a Memory / Clipse 4:30
21	Wake Up / Korn 3:35
22	Love Is Everlasting (Outro) 0:57

Barnes & Noble

It's been more than eight years since the music world lost Christopher "The Notorious B.I.G." Wallace, and with Duets: The Final Chapter, Sean "Diddy" Combs pays homage to his fallen friend. Featuring some of hip-hop's best producers and top-selling artists, the project updates some of Biggie's notable verses and rare freestyles, resulting in a wide array of tracks that live up to the Brooklyn MC's legacy. Although the disc relies on music that's been in the can for some years, the Duets here -- such as "1970 Something," with the Game and Faith Evans, "Mi Casa," featuring R. Kelly and Charlie Wilson -- sound surprisingly fresh and current. The haunting Jay-Z collaboration "Whatchu Want" suggests vintage Biggie, spotlighting his knack for delivering rhymes full of vivid imagery and witty punch lines. The same can be said for "Ultimate Rush," where Missy Elliott skillfully sculpts her rhymes around Big's lyrics to pull off a sex-filled call-and-response that feels like the MCs were actually in the vocal booth together. More highlights include collaborations with other deceased artists like Big Pun ("Get Your Grind On"), Bob Marley ("Hold Ya Head"), and Biggie's friend-turned-foe Tupac Shakur ("Living in Pain"). Ultimately, Duets succeeds in reminding us why we'll always love Big Poppa. Kwamé Hunter

All Music Guide

The weight of Notorious B.I.G.'s legacy is so profound that most major rap MCs and R&B singers alive -- and some who are dead -- are willing to be attached to it in whatever form possible. It could also be argued that anyone with the means is more than willing to profit from it in a monetary way. Here's Duets: The Final Chapter, released just before Christmas Day 2005, following 1999's Born Again, which was released just before Christmas Day 1999. Like Born Again, Duets takes bits of unused material from the late legend, and that can entail full-blown verses, looped declarations, or punctuative interjections. On some tracks, Biggie's presence is no more prominent than a handclap or a snare hit. Check the lead track "It Has Been Said," where he's limited to "what," "ungh," "yeah," "ha-ha," "uh-huh." If you can get past the fact that a lot of tracks barely feature the headliner, or listen without imagining the original contexts of the patched-together scraps, Duets can be sporadically riveting. The list of guests is overwhelming, with Jay-Z, Nas, Mary J. Blige, Faith Evans, R. Kelly, T.I., Slim Thug, Eminem, Lil Wayne, Missy Elliott, the Clipse, Snoop Dogg, and Freeway representing roughly half of the involved. Only a few tracks contain significant Biggie contributions, and it's not as if they provide any further insight or add to his long-established legend. Many of his vocals are not pulled from professional studio-quality recordings, which only makes them sound more displaced. Perhaps Korn's Jonathan Davis put it best when he told Billboard about the project: "It's f*ckin' weird to be doing a song with someone who is deceased!" His description applies to what it's like to listen to the disc. Andy Kellman