Lil WayneLil Wayne is a mastermind!
Lil Wayne has provided the hip-hop world with more swagger and excitement than many rappers manage in their careers. His fifth album, “Tha Carter II,” was released late last year ; whereas once Lil Wayne had been dismissed as a kiddie-rap novelty act, now he was delivering nimble rhymes and proclaiming himself “best rapper alive.” Then, came a mixtape, “Dedication 2,” which was partly a tribute to his native New Orleans. And he teamed with his longtime mentor, Baby (also known as Birdman), for a high-spirited CD, “Like Father, Like Son” (Cash Money/Universal).
Lil Wayne is impossibly prolific, yet he often sounds — to his credit — as if he’s just goofing off. Certainly that’s the feeling on the “Young Money” mixtape, which is named for his label. (He is also president of Cash Money Records, his longtime home.) It might be the wackiest Lil Wayne mixtape so far, which is saying something; in one free-associative rhyme, he delivers this nonsensical boast about his jewelry: “Check my pattern, scheme/ I probably have on rocks from the moon and Saturn’s ring.”
The tracks were compiled by Raj Smoove, a New Orleans D.J. And the emerging rappers on the CD, including Mack Maine and Curren$y.
This compilation offers yet another chance to hear a rapper in his prime, and few musical spectacles can compete with that.
Other artists that are hot at the present time includes
Lil Boosie,
Lil Scrappy and
Lil Jon.
Lil Wayne turns an old hip-hop controversy (Dr. Dre’s assault on a journalist) into a daffy boast: “I’m so fresh I should be smacked, like Dee Barnes/ And you’ll get smacked like a baseball by B. Bonds.” There are plenty of the usual dirty jokes, alongside more-sad-not-angry rhymes about Hurricane Katrina, his former partners in the Hot Boy$ and his father. And in “Amen,” he compresses years of frustration into three lines:
Government still quittin’ on us
Lost a few homies, and the grief still sittin’ on us
So we got they names written on us.
Like many rappers before him, Lil Wayne is promising that his next album will be a “classic”; unlike most of them, his prediction seems plausible. For now, he seems to be doing whatever he wants, and doing it effortlessly. You can almost believe that Lil Wayne’s hot streak will last indefinitely.
Lil Wayne
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