Reader Review: Lupe Fiasco - Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquor (September 19, 2006)

(Today's post, which happens to concern Lupe Fiasco's debut, um, fiasco (in my opinion), Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquor, is brought to you by potatokb. Here, he opts against the foreplay and jumps right into the review. Comments can be left below, as always.)

1. INTRO (FEAT IESHA JACO)

Spoken word poetry rap intro. Lame…

2. REAL (FEAT SARAH GREEN)

This beat is just awful. Lupe doesn’t rap well over it and the hook makes me want to press 'next'.

3. JUST MIGHT BE OK (FEAT GEMINI)

Please refer to "Real" for my general opinion of this track. (I would be forced to agree.)

4. KICK, PUSH

The first song I can actually listen to again with out my brain exploding. I like that Lupe is able to rhyme a decent song over a mellow Soundtrakk beat about something he loves, unlike most rappers that only seem to have a fondness for money and/or bitches.

5. I GOTCHA (FEAT PHARRELL WILLIAMS)

I like this song. It has a good beat by The Neptunes and some decent rhymes, even though I’m not 100% sure what the fuck Lupe's talking about on here. (My guess is that he's not referring to that Anthony Edwards/Linda Fiorentino flick Gotcha! from the 1980s. My Lord, that movie is boring as all hell.)

6. THE INSTRUMENTAL (FEAT JONAH MATRANGA)

The beat (from Fort Minor's Mike Shinoda, also from Linkin Park) on this song is good, but I find this song to be really repetitive; after the first time I hear that he "never lies", I never ever want to hear him tell a truth again. For your clarification (he means the two of you out there), that means the hook is horrible.

7. HE SAY, SHE SAY (FEAT GEMINI & SARAH GREEN)

This is the setup for Lupe’s character, "The Cool". I like the verse he spits, but the entire song is the same verse repeated twice with only slight variations, making this song not very memorable. (Which is weird when you think about it, since repetition is supposed to help you remember stuff. Oh well.)

8. SUNSHINE

Max, I’m going to take your word: Meh.

9. DAYDREAMIN’ (FEAT JILL SCOTT)

A good song. Lupe’s entire first verse, in which he equates people to body parts, is clever, and to my enjoyment Jill Scott brings me the first hook of the whole cd that doesn’t….hmmmm, what’s the word...oh, right, blow.

10. THE COOL

This song is the second installment of Lupe’s character "The Cool", and it also helps lay down the groundwork for his next disc, Lupe Fiasco's The Cool. (Can't imagine where Lupe got the title from.) This song is probably the second best track on the album.

11. HURT ME SOUL

An enjoyable cut. Lupe shows his intelligence in this song through the use of his social commentary, which in reality is probably lost on the masses. Oh well.

12. PRESSURE (FEAT JAY-Z & GEMINI)

This whole song is good. I like the beat of this one, even though I feel like Prolyfic spent too much effort on it, and both Lupe and Jay-Z spit entertaining verses, but the terrible hook (by Gemstones) kind of fucks its shit up. (I still believe that Jay-Z took a dive on this track in order to make Lupe seem like a better emcee than he actually was...at that point, in 2006. I will concede that Lupe's a better rapper now than he was when we first found him stuck to the bottom of our collective Chuck Taylor.)

13. AMERICAN TERRORIST (FEAT MATTHEW SANTOS)

The beat and hook on this song are terrible, but on the upside, Lupe has a couple of lines that save this song. Or, at least they could.

14. THE EMPEROR’S SOUNDTRACK

What the fuck?

15. KICK, PUSH II

The best song on this album, by far. It has a sick beat. Lupe drops what I think are his most clever lines in his style of social commentary. This song gives me hope for future greatness from his albums.

16. OUTRO

My advice to you: If you have the opportunity, just go bang your head against a wall for 12 minutes. That may be a bit more productive than actually listening to this really long outro. (Or you can spend those twelve minutes reading up on other albums on Hip Hop Isn't Dead. Just a thought.)

FINAL THOUGHTS: Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquor shows, to a decent extent, that Lupe Fiasco is an above average lyricist and he has great potential. Unfortunately, the album as a whole suffers from bad beats and worse hooks. Lupe needs to find better guests because Jonah Matranga and Matthew Santos do him a disservice.

BUY OR BURN? Burn this one because this album contains about 4 good songs, which is not enough to spend the 18 dollars (or whatever the cost). Your hard-earned (babysitting) money would be much better spent on his sophomore album, Lupe Fiasco's The Cool. (Or not, it's your call.)

BEST TRACKS: "Kick, Push II"; "The Cool"; "Hurt Me Soul"; "Pressure"

-potatokb

(Max here again. If you enjoyed this write-up, feel free to let the author know what you think by leaving some comments below. And tune in tomorrow, as this series of write-ups by the readers themselves continues. Here's a link to my first Lupe Fiasco review, for those that are interested.)