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Lupe Fiasco :: "Bottom, Top/Cold Blooded/Proper"Unreleased (2007)
"Impressive," meanwhile, is a word that's plagued Lupe Fiasco since he stopped being the dude that rapped on "Touch the Sky" and started being the dude that released Food & Liquor (2006). While he turned heads with dizzying rhyme schemes, GZA-worthy metaphors and word games, and a typically Chicagoan social conscience, a dearth of real fire and an inability to pander failed to net him many fans besides, like, me. I championed Food & Liquor as the fully-formed emergence of a great emcee, one that breathtakingly balanced pure mic prowess with wide-reaching cultural literacy. What makes Lupe infinitely more listenable than someone like Common is an early-'90s braggadocious wit, equal parts Q-Tip and Grand Puba; what makes Common infinitely more listenable than Lupe is, well, good production, and a willingness to mesh his raps more fully with the beat. You've gotta really, really like the idea of great rap in order to love Lupe. You've gotta be a college student in order to love Common.
This is why so many people are merely "impressed" by Lupe, and, to everyone's (especially my) chagrin, these three recently leaked tracks do nothing to change that. They are merely impressive if coming from a mixtape, outright disappointing if coming from his forthcoming sophomore record. Lyrical inspiration abounds: the chorus of "Bottom, Top" is a dizzying vertical cross section of Lupe's brain; "Cold Blooded" is an attempt at hard talk leavened by deep self-awareness ("Come outta pocket, then / This is just convenience / Don't think I need this / Pimping completes it / I am not stupid, and you are not a genius"); "Proper" contains the line "I hate crime like the Ku Klux Klan." But "Cold Blooded" has one of the worst choruses I've ever heard, "Bottom, Top" fails to explore its intriguing themes fully, and "Proper," despite functioning the best of these three, would still probably be the worst track on Food & Liquor. Lupe Fiasco is the most exciting and disappointing entity in hip hop. A trickle of new tracks solves nothing, and we're back where we started, wondering how this wunderkind's ever gonna release the great record in him when he refuses so obstinately to rap over a good beat.
Clayton Purdom :: 29 May 2007 |
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