Certain posthumous names from hip-hop’s history ring out down the decades, their legendary status seemingly growing rather than diminishing as the years go by. As one of the most fervently celebrated producers in the genre’s history, James ‘J Dilla’ Yancey is a prime example.

Following what seems like a permanent drip-drip-drip of unreleased instrumental tracks, we now have the apparently final LP of Dilla material – a vocal album intended for release before his untimely passing in 2002, and curated by Stones Throw’s Creative Director. At times, The Diary is gold-standard Dilla. The crisp, menacing, Introduction sets a suitably biographic tone. Lead single, The Anthem, featuring the reliably unruly Frank n Dank is strong (although was first released three years ago, when the album was first optimistically scheduled for release), and a sunny-side-up Madlib beat propels The Shining Part 1 along in true Jaylib spirit.

At times The Diary is confusing – additional production duties feel allocated in a slightly haphazard way. There are also some major clangers – the Gary Numan-sampling Trucks (like Cars, of course) sounds hamfisted and probably shouldn’t have made the cut. Albums like this raise questions about who really has ownership (creatively) of material that can only be interpreted in the context of the current cultural climate. Dilla obviously liked Trucks enough at the time to commit it to tape, but would he have released it now?

Donuts it ain’t, but if The Diary is the final statement from the J Dilla estate, it could have ended a whole lot worse.