You don't usually come to the gruff-voiced, stoic Bay Area rapper DaVinci for "flashy". His stock and trade has been formally tidy rap, full of old-school East Coast virtues: crisp beats, writerly bars, detailed narratives. On"Nothin Finna Stop Me," though, DaVinci seems to be having fun, chuckling audibly to himself as he leans on punch lines like "twist a cabbage like an egg roll" and "My money come quick like virgin sex." He still peppers the lyrics with his bits of street reportage-- "Young niggas eighteen walk around with grey hair"-- but they swirl together with the jokes and the beat, a generous spread of funk horns that producers Block Beattaz smear with some speaker-obliterating low end.

[from The MOEna Lisa; out 11/06/12 via SWTBRDS]