Wait--is this the guy we associate with chicken and beer, midgets hanging from necklaces and cigars burning the edges of hundred-dollar bills? You always thought that spending one night trapped in a Ludacris song would probably lead to a week-long hangover (and maybe an aborted fetus). Well, think what you want of the skirt-chasing and the AABB rhyme scheme rampant here--after all, we aren't talking about flowery Biggie Smalls metaphors or Ras Kass-inspired deconstructions of blackness. But on The Red Light District, Ludacris is on some next shit. Lest you think his main talent is making rude cameos on other people's hits, ask yourself: When was the last time you heard a rapper sing a slave chant right in the middle of the hottest Timbaland track in recent memory? And when Luda announces Life no different than those on minimum wage/More money, but still locked in a similar cage, you'll realize his mind delves far deeper than the sexual romps on the surface of his raps. Surely better critics have a fancier alternative for "Goddamn!" But I'll stick with that.