Does it say anything about the year in hip-hop when the most compelling character in the entire genre - Lil' Wayne, of all people - didn't even put out a studio album?
Or that two rap cash cows, Jay-Z and T.I. , dropped major releases under the premise that they were "concept records" or, better yet, as Jay-Z put it, a "conceptual body of genius work."
This is the time when music critics roll out their year-end lists full of rock and folk records plus the one or two token rap records that they show off like Colin Powell. This year it's Kanye West's "Graduation."
And as angry as you want to be because of that big old crater where rap should be, really, think about it: What was worthy?
Common's "Finding Forever" was a carbon copy of his previous album, "Be." Of lesser quality at that. Even if it was brilliantly marketed, "American Gangster" was Jay-Z's fourth-quarter Hail Mary. Seriously, he made it after he watched a movie. 50 Cent bet his career on "Curtis." Don't know whether that's an insult to the album or his career. T.I. fought himself and wound up in jail. Mos Def put an album out. Took it back. And put it out again.
There were small successes. UGK triumphed in its first group album since the end of Pimp C's jail stint. His death months later was as unexpected as it was untimely. Little Brother overcame label drama and internal strife to put out a fun, if brief, third album.
But there was nothing transcendent.
No "Stankonia."
No "Late Registration." (If Kanye wins a Grammy for "Graduation," it'll be a make-up call because he got hosed on "Late Registration.")
Not even the pleasant surprise that "Be" was in 2005.
If anything, this year rap seemed to be about single moments.
How else do you explain Andre 3000 making the most random guest spots and somehow taking a stranglehold on people's attention every time. Meanwhile, Lil' Wayne figured it out. Every week it seemed like the guy was figuring out something or someone new to compare himself to. Nothing too fancy, still somehow clever enough. Tyrannosaurus Rex. Keisha Cole's family. A clock on the wall (they can count, don't you know?). Not only did he single-handedly make this year's BET Hip-Hop Awards relevant, but he also made it a party (who brings Styrofoam cups onstage?).
The closest thing to transcendence was "Da Drought 3," one more addition to the bottomless pit that seems to be Lil' Wayne's mixtape catalog. It was crisp and somehow compellingly incoherent. (Really, Wayne, when you were 5, your favorite movie was "Gremlins"? Really?) But still it was a mixtape. A double-disc red herring. A comet that Wayne's been riding for almost a year now.
I'd love to say maybe that's where the good music was - on the mixtape circuit (Little Brother put out another really good one, "And Justus for All"). Plus the front-runner in the mixtape game, DJ Drama, got pinched at the beginning of the year on racketeering charges. Ever since then, the industy has been trying to come up with a way to legitimize mixtapes, which is an oxymoron. Eventually, people started giving their mixtapes away for free on the Internet: Royce Da 5'9 popped up trying to sell his verses for dirt cheap and Joe Budden put out some really weird records about really obscure rappers.
There was some decent subcommercial stuff. Black Milk seems to be the preeminent producer/rapper, and Soulstice was solid enough. But this time last year, Nas declared hip-hop dead and, man, if that didn't set the tone. The leaders of hip-hop took one look at the new wave of chain-dangling, finger-snapping ringtone makers, and it's like they assassinated themselves. Scarface himself said maybe Soulja Boy could help him with his MySpace game.
The reliable names that did drop albums late in the year were more like pindrops than explosions. They weren't terrible releases, either, but they were largely overlooked. Scarface, always consistent, somehow hop-scotched from being a paper-chasing dog to an Al Bundy-like husband tired of his nagging wife on "Made," a more-than-solid effort. Beanie Siegel and Freeway released albums in the shadow of Jay-Z, whose resignation as president of the Def Jam label should resolve his obvious conflict of interest. Seriously, it was like the Yankees making A-Rod the manager. What do you think he's going to with the lineup card?
Earlier this month Styles P, who scares me (I feel like he's the type to wear a leather coat because it's hard to fit guns in a fleece), dropped a ton of bars on "Super Gangster/Extraordinary Gentleman." But he's at his best painting gritty portraits of life on the corner. That's a tough sell to a Grammy group that gave its first rap award to the Fresh Prince and Jazzy Jeff and didn't even recognize Jay-Z until he started sampling Broadway musicals. Jay-Z actually boycotted the Grammys because he thought mainstream critics were biased against genuine hip-hop. Maybe he was right.
For some reason, rap nerds and music critics get this self-gratifying feeling because they like Lupe Fiasco's "The Cool." Not necessarily because it was good, but because it was different. It was some kind of dark, moralizing narrative scored to heavy chords and strings.
You know the best part about the album, though? Lupe can rap. He skillfully assembles syllables in a way that's all his own.
It's a shame. Lil' Wayne's "Tha Carter III" was intended to be a summer release, but it probably won't come out until February at best. It's like he's holed up alone with the pressure of putting out the greatest rap record ever, which seems impossible in this climate because everybody's great idea is this concept record. So he's playing around on mixtapes, crooning hooks into voice synthesizers like T-Pain instead of crafting the addictive and spacey rhymes that hooked people to begin with.
All he has to do is rap, but rappers are rarely rewarded for just rapping.
Source-www.boston.com
Or that two rap cash cows, Jay-Z and T.I. , dropped major releases under the premise that they were "concept records" or, better yet, as Jay-Z put it, a "conceptual body of genius work."
This is the time when music critics roll out their year-end lists full of rock and folk records plus the one or two token rap records that they show off like Colin Powell. This year it's Kanye West's "Graduation."
And as angry as you want to be because of that big old crater where rap should be, really, think about it: What was worthy?
Common's "Finding Forever" was a carbon copy of his previous album, "Be." Of lesser quality at that. Even if it was brilliantly marketed, "American Gangster" was Jay-Z's fourth-quarter Hail Mary. Seriously, he made it after he watched a movie. 50 Cent bet his career on "Curtis." Don't know whether that's an insult to the album or his career. T.I. fought himself and wound up in jail. Mos Def put an album out. Took it back. And put it out again.
There were small successes. UGK triumphed in its first group album since the end of Pimp C's jail stint. His death months later was as unexpected as it was untimely. Little Brother overcame label drama and internal strife to put out a fun, if brief, third album.
But there was nothing transcendent.
No "Stankonia."
No "Late Registration." (If Kanye wins a Grammy for "Graduation," it'll be a make-up call because he got hosed on "Late Registration.")
Not even the pleasant surprise that "Be" was in 2005.
If anything, this year rap seemed to be about single moments.
How else do you explain Andre 3000 making the most random guest spots and somehow taking a stranglehold on people's attention every time. Meanwhile, Lil' Wayne figured it out. Every week it seemed like the guy was figuring out something or someone new to compare himself to. Nothing too fancy, still somehow clever enough. Tyrannosaurus Rex. Keisha Cole's family. A clock on the wall (they can count, don't you know?). Not only did he single-handedly make this year's BET Hip-Hop Awards relevant, but he also made it a party (who brings Styrofoam cups onstage?).
The closest thing to transcendence was "Da Drought 3," one more addition to the bottomless pit that seems to be Lil' Wayne's mixtape catalog. It was crisp and somehow compellingly incoherent. (Really, Wayne, when you were 5, your favorite movie was "Gremlins"? Really?) But still it was a mixtape. A double-disc red herring. A comet that Wayne's been riding for almost a year now.
I'd love to say maybe that's where the good music was - on the mixtape circuit (Little Brother put out another really good one, "And Justus for All"). Plus the front-runner in the mixtape game, DJ Drama, got pinched at the beginning of the year on racketeering charges. Ever since then, the industy has been trying to come up with a way to legitimize mixtapes, which is an oxymoron. Eventually, people started giving their mixtapes away for free on the Internet: Royce Da 5'9 popped up trying to sell his verses for dirt cheap and Joe Budden put out some really weird records about really obscure rappers.
There was some decent subcommercial stuff. Black Milk seems to be the preeminent producer/rapper, and Soulstice was solid enough. But this time last year, Nas declared hip-hop dead and, man, if that didn't set the tone. The leaders of hip-hop took one look at the new wave of chain-dangling, finger-snapping ringtone makers, and it's like they assassinated themselves. Scarface himself said maybe Soulja Boy could help him with his MySpace game.
The reliable names that did drop albums late in the year were more like pindrops than explosions. They weren't terrible releases, either, but they were largely overlooked. Scarface, always consistent, somehow hop-scotched from being a paper-chasing dog to an Al Bundy-like husband tired of his nagging wife on "Made," a more-than-solid effort. Beanie Siegel and Freeway released albums in the shadow of Jay-Z, whose resignation as president of the Def Jam label should resolve his obvious conflict of interest. Seriously, it was like the Yankees making A-Rod the manager. What do you think he's going to with the lineup card?
Earlier this month Styles P, who scares me (I feel like he's the type to wear a leather coat because it's hard to fit guns in a fleece), dropped a ton of bars on "Super Gangster/Extraordinary Gentleman." But he's at his best painting gritty portraits of life on the corner. That's a tough sell to a Grammy group that gave its first rap award to the Fresh Prince and Jazzy Jeff and didn't even recognize Jay-Z until he started sampling Broadway musicals. Jay-Z actually boycotted the Grammys because he thought mainstream critics were biased against genuine hip-hop. Maybe he was right.
For some reason, rap nerds and music critics get this self-gratifying feeling because they like Lupe Fiasco's "The Cool." Not necessarily because it was good, but because it was different. It was some kind of dark, moralizing narrative scored to heavy chords and strings.
You know the best part about the album, though? Lupe can rap. He skillfully assembles syllables in a way that's all his own.
It's a shame. Lil' Wayne's "Tha Carter III" was intended to be a summer release, but it probably won't come out until February at best. It's like he's holed up alone with the pressure of putting out the greatest rap record ever, which seems impossible in this climate because everybody's great idea is this concept record. So he's playing around on mixtapes, crooning hooks into voice synthesizers like T-Pain instead of crafting the addictive and spacey rhymes that hooked people to begin with.
All he has to do is rap, but rappers are rarely rewarded for just rapping.
Source-www.boston.com
