''UGK 4 Life'' is the sixth and final studio album by American

hip-hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hi ...

duo UGK. It was released on March 31, 2009, by

Jive Records Jive Records (later stylized as JIVE Records) was a British-American independent record label founded by Clive Calder in 1981 as a subsidiary of the Zomba Group of Companies, Zomba Group. In the US, the label had offices in New York City and Chic ...

. Recording sessions took place at Mad Studios in

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

, Swagger Studios in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, Trill Cave Studios in Port Arthur, Maximedia Studios in

Dallas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

, Chung King Studios and Legacy Recording Studios in New York, and Silent Sound Recording Studios in

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

. Production was handled by Cory Mo, Pimp C, Steve Below, Averexx, DJ B-Do, Mannie Fresh and

Akon Aliaune Damala Bouga Time Puru Nacka Lu Lu Lu Badara Akon Thiam (born April 16, 1973), known mononymously as Akon (), is a Senegalese-United States, American singer, songwriter, rapper, record producer, businessman, and philanthropist. An influ ...

, with Mike Dean and Giorgio Tuinfort serving as co-producers. It features

guest appearance The term guest appearance generally denotes the appearance of a guest in an artistic or pop-culture setting. The guests themselves (referred to as guest artists, featured artists, guest stars, or guest fighters, depending on context), are disting ...

s from

8Ball & MJG 8Ball & MJG is an American hip hop music, hip hop duo from Orange Mound, Memphis, Orange Mound, Memphis, Tennessee. They met at Ridgeway Middle School (Memphis, Tennessee), Ridgeway Middle School in 1984. In 1993, the duo released their debut al ...

, Akon,

Big Gipp Cameron F. Gipp (born April 28, 1973), better known by his stage name Big Gipp, is an American rapper. He is a member of the Atlanta-based hip hop group Goodie Mob, with whom he has released six studio albums, as well as the duo Ali & Gipp, with ...

B-Legit Brandt Jones , better known by his stage name B-Legit, is an American rapper from Vallejo, California. Career Before he started his music career, he went to Grambling State University. He became a member of The Click, a rap group formed by his ...

E-40 Earl Tywone Stevens (born November 15, 1967), better known by his stage name E-40, is an American rapper. Stevens is a founding member of the rap group The Click (band), The Click and the founder of Sick Wid It Records. He has released 27 stud ...

Lil' Boosie Torence Ivy Hatch Jr. (born November 14, 1982), better known by his stage name Boosie BadAzz or simply Boosie (formerly Lil' Boosie), is an American rapper. Hatch began rapping in the 1990s as a member of the Southern hip hop collective Concent ...

, Raheem DeVaughn,

Ronald Isley Ronald Isley ( ; born May 21, 1941) is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. Isley is the lead singer and founding member of the family music group The Isley Brothers. Early life Born in 1941 to Sallye Bernice (née Bell) and O ...

Sleepy Brown Patrick Leroy "Sleepy" Brown (born January 24, 1970) is an American singer-songwriter and record producer. He is one-third of the Atlanta-based production team of Organized Noize, which has created hits for acts such as Outkast, Goodie Mob an ...

Snoop Dogg Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. ( ; born October 20, 1971), better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg (previously Snoop Doggy Dogg), is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Rooted in West Coast hip-hop, he is widely regarded as one of t ...

Too $hort Todd Anthony Shaw (born April 28, 1966), better known by his stage name Too Short (stylized as Too $hort), is an American rapper. A pioneer of West Coast hip-hop, Shaw was among the first acts to receive recognition in the genre during the late ...

and

Webbie Webster Gradney Jr. (born September 6, 1985) who performs under the mononym Webbie, is an American rapper. He has been signed to the independent Trill Entertainment label since 2003. In 2005 he came into the hip hop scene with "Gimme That" fe ...

. In the United States, the album debuted at number six on the ''Billboard'' 200, number two on the

Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a music chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine that ranks R&B and hip-hop albums based on sales in the United States and is compiled by Luminate. The chart debuted as Hot R&B LPs in the issue dated January 30, ...

and topped the Rap Albums charts, selling 77,000 copies in its first week. The album was supported with the only single " Da Game Been Good to Me", which peaked at number 84 on the US ''Billboard''

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by '' Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 ...

. The album marks the first posthumously released album for the Underground Kingz member Pimp C, as the rapper was found dead in his room at the Mondrian Hotel in Los Angeles on December 4, 2007.

Background

In March 2008, Bun B confirmed the final UGK studio album would be dedicated to the late Pimp C. The first single "Da Game Been Good to Me" was released onto the Internet on January 16, 2009. It was made available on

iTunes iTunes is a media player, media library, and mobile device management (MDM) utility developed by Apple. It is used to purchase, play, download and organize digital multimedia on personal computers running the macOS and Windows operating s ...

on February 12, 2009. Bun B stated he recorded a song dedicated to his late partner Pimp C. Bun B stated that he would not experiment with new collaborations or producers.

Critical reception

''UGK 4 Life'' was met with universal acclaim from

music critics Music journalism (or music criticism) is media criticism and reporting about music topics, including popular music, classical music, and traditional music. Journalists began writing about music in the eighteenth century, providing commentary on ...

. At

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

score of 84, based on eleven reviews. Chase Hoffberger of ''

The Austin Chronicle ''The Austin Chronicle'' is an alternative weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demogra ...

'' praised the album, calling it "one fantastic curtain call". Jeff Weiss of ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' called it "the rare swan song that manages to be essential for the music alone". Steve Juon of RapReviews wrote: "from the 'Intro' to the 'Outro' there's very little to not like about ''UGK 4 Life'' other than the fact it can never be done again, and any music videos released off this album won't feature Pimp doin' his thang". Jordan Sargent of ''

PopMatters ''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, ...

'' concluded: "the fact that this has been UGK's music for nearly two decades doesn't blunt the impact of the album, and so ''UGK 4 Life'' is comfort food for

Southern rap Southern hip-hop, also known as Southern rap, South Coast hip-hop, or dirty south, is a blanket term for a regional genre of American hip-hop music that emerged in the Southern United States, especially in Georgia, Texas, Louisiana, Tennessee, ...

heads: not as invigorating as the first time, but still the best all the same". Ian Cohen of ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...

'' resumed: "though probably not the best UGK album, it might be the strongest illustration of what they do best". Clayton Purdom of

Cokemachineglow ''Cokemachineglow'' was a Canadian webzine dedicated mainly to music criticism, though it also featured articles about local music scenes. It was founded in 2002 and closed down permanently at the end of 2015. In 2006, it was described as one of ...

found the album "leaves listeners wondering where they might go next". Thomas Golianopoulos of '' Spin'' called it "a fitting capper to this Texas duo's storied career--nothing groundbreaking, just funky, rough-hewn, celebratory tracks".

Track listing

;Sample credits *Track 4 contains a sample from "Feel That You're Feelin'" written by Frankie Beverly as performed by

Maze A maze is a path or collection of paths, typically from an entrance to a goal. The word is used to refer both to branching tour puzzles through which the solver must find a route, and to simpler non-branching ("unicursal") patterns that lead ...

. *Track 5 contains a portion of the composition "Here We Go Again" written by Ernie Isley, Marvin Isley,

, O'Kelly Isley Jr.,

Rudolph Isley Rudolph "Rudy" Bernard Isley (April 1, 1939 – October 11, 2023) was an American singer-songwriter and Christian minister and one of the founding members of The Isley Brothers. Life and career Rudolph "Rudy" Bernard Isley was born on April 1, ...

and Chris Jasper. *Track 8 contains a sample from "Peaches & Erb" written by Patrick Brown, Raymond Murray, Rico Wade and Ruben Bailey as performed by Society of Soul. *Track 9 contains a sample from "Try Love Again" written by Michael Hawkins and Lee Hutson as performed by The Natural Four. *Track 10 contains a sample from "I Left It Wet for You" written by Chad Butler and Bernard Freeman as performed by UGK.

Personnel

* Chad " Pimp C" Butler — vocals, producer , executive producer * Bernard " Bun B" Freeman — vocals, executive producer * Raheem DeVaughn — vocals *

— vocals * Patrick " Sleepy" Brown — vocals * Cameron "

" Gipp — vocals * Torrance "

" Hatch — vocals * Webster "

" Gradney — vocals * Earl "

" Stevens — vocals * Brandt "

" Jones — vocals * Premro " 8Ball" Smith — vocals * Marlon " MJG" Goodwin — vocals * Todd "

" Shaw — vocals * Calvin "

" Broadus — vocals * Aliaune

Thiam — vocals and producer * Rick Marcel — additional guitars * Cory "Mo" Moore — producer , recording * Steve Below — producer * Byron " Mannie Fresh" Thomas — producer * Avery "Averexx" Harris — producer , recording , mixing * Bradley " DJ B-Do" Davis — producer and recording * Mike Dean — co-producer , mixing, mastering * Giorgio Tuinfort — co-producer * Mike Mo — recording , mixing * Matt Aslanian — recording * Ari Raskin — recording * Mark "Exit" Goodchild — recording * Chris Soper — recording * Leslie Brathwaite — mixing * Hal Fitzgerald — additional recording * Bob Brown — additional recording * James " J. Prince" Smith — executive producer * Jeff Gilligan — art direction, design * Pam Francis — photography * Keith Bardin — photography * Shawn Mortensen — photography * Clay Patrick McBride — photography * Anzel Jennings — A&R, management * Jeffrey Sledge — A&R * Rick Martin — management * Bernard Max Resnick — legal

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ugk 4 Life UGK albums 2009 albums Jive Records albums Albums produced by Akon Albums produced by Mannie Fresh Albums produced by Mike Dean (record producer) Albums published posthumously