Eminem has developed a habit of messing up my damn column. I meant to start off writing about how bad Drake is, but Slim had to go and create a bunch of noise again. First came the freestyle “Despicable,” which solidified my excitement and faith in the whole Recovery thing. Go listen to it right now if you haven’t. Eminem is back, with the clever lines we used to expect. How about this: “It’ll never be my chair that you on, crown so tight that it cuts off circulation to the brain, no oxygen, other words, there’s no heir to the throne.” Let’s just take a moment to say, “damn.”
Now he’s dropped his first single, “Not Afraid.” I’m not sure what the general reaction to the track will be, but it does what it needs to do. He’s gotta make this comeback to making real music after the self-obsession of Relapse, and the sing-along chorus will help him do that on the charts. Boi-1da’s beat is simple, as tends to be the norm for his work, but the track works, as the slow, wanting-to-be-epic beat slides forwardly placidly adding to Eminem’s words. If nothing else, I love that he goes so far as to say, putting on the faux accent briefly: “Let’s be honest, that last Relapse CD was ‘ehhhh’/Perhaps I ran them accents into the ground, relax, I ain’t going back to that now.” More proof that Eminem is back in the comfortable realm of reality, and that Recovery will succeed.
Boi-1da hip-hop’s go-to producer of late, popping up just about everywhere this year. He’s partially responsible for helping Drake into a position of popularity, producing the mega-collab single “Forever,” on which every other rapper brutally killed Drake. Going after Drake may seem like the typical attack lately, but I still think this is worth doing.
Drake entered my iTunes with So Far Gone; I’d been comfortably unaware of his previous tapes. I didn’t really dislike the tape, it was the first record I’d heard that to some extent worked in regards to what it was trying to do. The thing was superior to 808s & Heartbreak and was coming from a smaller artist. So if anything, I thought Drake was just fine at first. Then he started to blow up, and slowly drive me insane. Gone worked as the insecure, hipster piece that it was. “Best I Ever Had” was alright as a pop love song, and really didn’t bother me. Somewhere along the way, though, Drake has become a grand fabrication.
The guy’s a Canadian who starred on a teen soap opera. He’s talking about being stuck in his momma’s basement on a Timbaland track? Fitting that the same album had Miley Cyrus on it too. His shred of legitimacy came from the awkwardness he showed on Gone, from the wannabe artsy tracks, like “Lust for Life.” Whoops. He got big. So why bother to be any shade of honest? He started showing up everywhere, and began saying less and less. His appearances on the Young Money collab album? Every verse he does nowadays regards either his appeal to women or how he got really famous really quickly. We get it. The self important video for “Over” really isn’t making us like you anymore, Drake. Or this new track, “Find Your Love”? Not a second of rapping on it, Drake can regard himself as the first rapper that started auto tuning so he could sing and then decided he’d spend entire songs just doing the latter. (Okay, so maybe that’s T-Pain).
All of Drake’s popularity simple hinges on his ego, and while this has always gotten people places in hip hop, Drake has little else to offer. These new guys just don’t know how to flow, and somehow this ended up getting seen as “different.” Afraid you’ve simply mistaken a lack of talent for ingenuity. His clumsy flow moves forward in short little bursts, chugging along stupidly. It’s easy to listen to because of its simplicity, so of course people are going to remember the songs. Honestly, if I heard the lines, “Love ya sushi roll, hotter than wasabi, I’ma race for your love, shake and bake Ricky Bobby,” from anyone but Drake, I’d think they were a joke, wouldn’t you? His “sexy” lyrics remind me of the rap song from the beginning of Tropic Thunder (“I Love tha Pussy”).
Essentially, fuck Drake. The best thing he’s done is career is to have the courtesy to fall on stage (Find and watch the video, simply hilarious). He’s quickly – along with a bunch of other guys – diluting hip hop more than it already has been. The more of these new generations come in without anything to say, the sooner hip hop really will be dead. Hell, at least Eminem’s back.
Lastly, on a more somber note, this is the first chance I’ve had to recognize Guru’s passing. Probably due to their lack of activity, Gang Starr has not been receiving the respect they deserve for a while, and if it had to be this loss to bring attention back to where it belongs, we should be disappointed. If you’re following the drama, you know Solar is trying to keep drama alive, trying to make more of a villain out of Premiere. Supposedly Guru wrote a bitter letter stating he didn’t want his former partner involved in any aspect of his remembrance, but consensus seems to agree that the letter was forged by Solar and that Guru was in a coma during the supposed time of writing said letter. That such a loss has been turned into a beef of sorts is saddening and pathetic if the letter was indeed forged. Let’s focus on remembering the brilliant MC that Guru was, easily one of the best of all time, and we should not forget simply because his best work is remembered as Gang Starr.
Track Spotlight
Adding a track spotlight, as a way to further investigate artists, an outlet for discussion of their most recent output and that of their album’s chances for success.
Eminem – “Not Afraid”: A song that gets better by the listen. Probably the reason I had 20+ plays of it in the first few hours it was in my iTunes. It takes some getting used to, it’s Eminem as an older voice, it’s the first time we’ve really heard him spitting as an all out veteran, and the beat itself sounds like it should belong to an old school rapper. Yes, it’s weird thinking of Em as old school. The grandiose chorus can come off as iffy, but for the grand “happy” message it just kind of works when you accept it. It’s essentially just great to hear Eminem question his past attitude and recent output while he makes strides towards his old self.
Nas & Damian Marley – “My Generation”: Songs from this oft delayed collab have been nearly sneaked to their audience. Nothing from this would-be-important effort has been put out with any fanfare, singles are being treated like buzz tracks. This track features Lil Wayne and Joss Stone, so there’s plenty of fame to go around on this four-person face off. That said, there’s not too much here. The song wants so badly to be more than real, but it comes off as a bit forced. Speaking to the people is all well and good, but try and make sure you have something they haven’t heard time and time again.
Big Boi – “Shutterbug”: The latest track dished out from Big Boi’s permanently delayed first solo offering. Just like all the other tracks he’s leaked, it’s a great bit of Southern hip hop. The thudding beat rolls greasily forward while Big Boi spins over it with his battered flow. The man’s been offering a slew of perfect pop rap tunes for a while now to represent this album, all perfectly creative, this is a public service announcement: Def Jam, release the album, it’s been moved around enough already.
