Reader Review: Lil' Wayne - Tha Carter III (August 18, 2008)

(Yeah, so here's the deal: I didn't listen to Tha Carter III, and I have no immediate plans to do so. But Archibald, late of his recommendation of Common's Universal Mind Control, has, so in the interest of fairness for all facets of the hip hop diamond, I'm letting him have the floor, nearly italic-free, because he has a lot to say and I want him to get started already, and also, what part of "I haven't listened to it" can't be understood?. Leave your comments in the usual place, and who knows: if enough people start leaving messages, I may actually try to find this at my local library someday.)

Okay, so I have a confession to make: Tha Carter III is NOT my favorite rap album. By far, that honor would be held by Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) by the Wu-Tang Clan, a group so amazingly great that any time another rapper tries to rip them off they usually hit paydirt (See Carter, Shawn and Reasonable Doubt. Dude should have just cut Raekwon a check for wholesale biting the style of Only Built 4 Cuban Linx...).

However, do we really need to talk about the Wu-Tang any more? The answer to that question is “Probably. But not today.”

I knew that I wanted to write a review for the site, and I racked my brain for other hip hop albums I knew front to back, and discovered that those albums were either all Wu-centric affairs, or this other little-loved indie album that’s only like ten tracks long, I’m pretty sure it’s called Illmatic or some crazy shit. And then I thought back to somewhat of a lost weekend that I had in the months of June and July last year (clearly he was bumping a bootleg, since the disc wasn't released until August of 2008), where all I listened to was one very, very popular rap album made by America’s favorite codeine enthusiast. Guess what we’re I’m referring to. I dare you.

Yep.

Today we shall discuss the curious case of DeWayne Carter Jr., a young man both loved and reviled in hip hop circles for rapping about unimaginative topics in the most imaginative way possible, a young man who has taken to calling himself the “Best Rapper Alive,” a move that, last time I checked, wasn’t controversial at all.

I’ll get back to Wayne, but first I want to spend a couple minutes with Jay-Z. Who has two thumbs and hates the last person who called himself the “Best Rapper Alive?” This guy (this is the part where I’m point both of my thumbs at myself, but you can’t really see me doing that as you’re reading this on the internet as opposed to hearing me drunkenly ramble about this at some keg party). Point is, fuck that guy. He made it big ripping off Biggie, Nas, and the Wu and then threw both Nas and Jaz-O (his mentor and the guy who gave him his name) under a bus once he made it big. The guy has never had an original thought in his life, and literally all of his songs depend on the production for success like those fucking vampires in the Twilight books depend on blood (or abstinence) to remain alive. And he holds himself up like he’s this paragon of unmatched lyricism, and then he releases song after song about how fucking rich he is.

The point of the preceding paragraph is that I’m not exactly bummed that Weezy took that title away from the Jiggaman; however, if there were any justice in this world the best rapper alive crown would be worn by somebody like Wale or Blu, two rappers who are roughly the same age as Weezy F. Baby but miles out of his league lyrically and way more sober. However, you’ve got to hand it to Wayne: Tha Carter III was a monster in the sales department, having sold three million copies in a year where an album made by a super-group featuring Sly Stone, Michael Jackson, a fresh-out-of-hiding-in-the-Bahamas Tupac, and featuring not one but two guest verses by Bigfoot (who I’ve heard has a pretty good flow) probably would have struggled to go gold. So regardless of how much Max and the rest of the internet would like to plug their ears and pretend it didn’t happen, Tha Carter III demands to be discussed. So without further adieu:

1. 3 PEAT
You’ve got to hand it to Wayne, he’s actually legitimately dedicated to lyricism, at least in the sense that he’s not just going to let the production do the work for him. This songs clocks in at over three minutes, and for the majority of the track, it’s just Wayne spitting his shit, sans hook. The instrumental functions mainly as background for Wayne to rap over, but the strings towards are a nice surprise and give the song a classical lean (pun intended). I guess the strings shouldn’t really be that big of a surprise, seeing as the track was produced by some dude named Maestro.

2. MR. CARTER (FEAT JAY-Z)
When this track first burst on the scene, everybody tried to place the dusty soul sample that functions as the track’s hook. Turns out said sample is non-existent; it was sung by one of the track’s producers and then manipulated to sound old and sped-up. With the exception of the sample, the instrumental is pretty organic, which is gigantically fucking jarring when compared to “3 Peat,” which sounds like it was composed on a Macbook in like fifteen minutes. Weezy gets bonus points for poop jokes, but he loses points for laughing at said jokes, which is a habit of his that gets annoying. Jay-Z doesn’t do the track any favors by talking about how he’s a martyr, and then talking about how rich he is. Again, fuck that guy. I still like this song though.

3. A MILLI
So yeah, Bangladesh (the idiot who produced this track) stole a sample of Phife Dawg saying the phrase “A milli” from the intro Tribe’s reggae-tinged (and Fatboy Slim-produced) remix to “I Left My Wallet in El Segundo.” That was a stupid move. But Wayne, for the second time in three songs, does that trick where he just raps for three minutes and keeps your attention for most of it. He compares himself to Andre 3000, which is actually a valid comparison I think. Weezy kind of actually raps like Andre 3000, assuming he were on more (or, depending on where you get your information from, different) drugs.

4. GOT MONEY (FEAT T-PAIN)
I’m pretty sure that they’re going to take my right to use the internet away from me as punishment for liking this song. But I have a confession to make: I LOVE willfully shitty hip hop. It’s almost like Lil Wayne had a checklist of things he had to write about for the song that was obviously to meant to be a hit single: having lots money, how much girls love him, vague threats to those who associate with the police, having lots of expensive jewelry, referencing a bunch of old hits, referencing all of his nicknames, autotune. All are accomplished in short order. And Jesus Fucking Christ, I fucking love this song so much. Also, kudos to the video, which for some bizarre reason tries to pretend the song is about robbing a bank because of Hurricane Katrina.

5. COMFORTABLE (FEAT BABYFACE)
Okay so if I haven’t already lost you, please bear with me because I’m about to tie hip hop and country together. So in the fifties, there was this trend in Honky Tonk called “the response song” where a female would respond to the lyrics of a male singer’s song. As in, Hank Williams would record a song called “Cold Cold Heart” and then a girl would record a response song called “My Cold Cold Heart is Melted Now.” Well, “Comfortable” borrows this trend and functions as a response to Beyonce’s “Irreplaceable.” The basic thesis of “Irreplaceable” was, “You will never find another girl like me. I am irreplaceable.” “Comfortable” responds by saying, “You are incorrect. I will find another girl like you. Fuck off.” It’s pretty clear that this is Kanye-produced track is a leftover that was collecting dust on his hard drive, because it doesn’t really mesh with the production styles of his Graduation prog-rap or the beep-centric emo bullshit that was 808’s & Heartbreak.

6. DR. CARTER
Lil Wayne pretends to be a doctor, which is a pretty funny thing to think about seeing as I’m pretty sure the dude didn’t finish high school. (To be fair, he was attending college classes in Houston right up until he became really huge.) I swear to God this song wouldn’t sound out of place on a Tribe album. Also, in the song Dr. Carter lets two out of his three patients die, which by any calculation makes him a pretty shitty doctor.

7. PHONE HOME
Cool & Dre should not be allowed to produce any more music. That is all.

8. TIE MY HANDS (FEAT. ROBIN THICKE)
When I first saw this song’s title and heard that it was produced by Robin Thicke, I KNEW that this song was about fucking. And then I listened to it, and it’s actually an honest, poignant representation of the frustrations held by a lot of New Orleans residents after Hurricane Katrina. On the other hand, he talks about shooting somebody’s grandmother in the face on the album’s first song, so I guess that kind of discounts what he says here.

9. MRS. OFFICER (FEAT. BOBBY VALENTINO)
The first time I heard this song, I thought it was fucking hilarious. It’s about having sex with a police officer. And then I realized that this song is stupid. Moving on.

10. LET THE BEAT BUILD
Wayne just kind of babbles about random bullshit here, so I guess that now is a good point in the write-up to address why I think that people hate Lil Wayne so much. His writing process basically just involves him taking a bunch of drugs and rapping about the first thing that comes to mind. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, but it’s most often interesting. This is not a man who puts a lot of thought into his raps. But then again, does Kool Keith really make that much sense?

11. SHOOT ME DOWN (FEAT D. SMITH)
This song is about Lil Wayne talking tough to a mirror and then shooting himself in the chest on accident. But it comes off like a shitty Linkin Park song, which is pretty funny because Busta Rhymes actually did a song with Linkin Park that sounds WAY worse than this song, that isn’t all that great to begin with. So at least Weezy probably got his shitty track for way cheaper than Busta did.

12. LOLLIPOP (FEAT STATIC MAJOR)
Remember that time about a year ago when you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hearing this song? Yeah, me too. Ironically, Wayne sings a lot like said dead cat, only ran through Autotune.

13. LA LA (FEAT BRISCO AND BUSTA RHYMES)
Speaking of Busta, he pops up here and provides a bizarre verse about how diseased his money is. Brisco is just wallpaper here, but he drops a good line about how he’s higher than gas prices. However, the less said about this beat, the better. Those looking for an actual good song should go for the unreleased track “La La La” which is a different song that probably didn’t see the light of day because of sample bullshit.

14. PLAYING WITH FIRE (FEAT BETTY WRIGHT)
This song steals wholesale from the Rolling Stones song of the same name, and the Stones got pissed off about it and sued Lil Wayne for tarnishing their image (yeah, because the Rolling Stones didn’t do lots of drugs and have lots of sex with random women) and successfully got the song removed from all future pressings of Tha Carter III, which is a shame, because this is a pretty good song.

15. YOU AIN’T GOT NUTHIN (FEAT FABOLOUS AND JUELZ SANTANA)
Alchemist and Deezle cook up an ominous instrumental over which Fab, Juelz Santana and Wayne make threats to an unknown entity, presumably for the offense of “hating.” Weezy bats cleanup here, and wins the “C. Montgomery Burns Best Verse Award,” partially for the correct use of the word “asinine,” but mainly because he manages to sound like a complete and total crazy person.

16. DONTGETIT
I’ll admit, I have a soft spot in my heart for Nina Simone (what, you thought I only listened to hip hop?), so I love it when she’s sampled in hip hop songs. Anywho, the two verses on here are actually pretty great. It’s stuff like this that makes Lil Wayne actually pretty good. If you listen to this song, he manages to sound intelligent, threatening, stupid, and funny, sometimes all at the same time. After dropping his verses, DeWayne smokes a blunt in the booth and launches into a rant about drug laws and Al Sharpton. And like that, the album ends.

FINAL THOUGHTS: Lil Wayne is not the best rapper alive. He is also not the worst. However, he is probably the most popular rapper today, which kind of makes people hate him. The songs on here are pretty neatly put into three categories: hardcore songs with hyper-violent lyrics, songs that are meant to be “conscious” or at least show a modicum of intelligence, and finally the songs that are overtly poppy and meant to be released as singles. Overall, Tha Carter III isn’t really all that different from other hip hop albums. Now I know that Saigon or some other internet indie bullshit is probably “better” than Lil Wayne, but honestly, do we always need better? Can’t we just settle for entertaining? In closing, this is my third-favorite rap album. Oh yeah, and blah blah blah Joe Budden Royce da 5’9, when is Wale’s album coming out, whatever.

BUY OR BURN? Let’s be real here. If you don’t already own this album, you aren’t going to buy it. If you are old, you will ignore Tha Carter III’s existence and listen to O.C.’s first album again, and if you are young, you will probably illegally download it. So there.

BEST TRACKS: “Mr. Carter,” “Got Money,” “Dr. Carter,” “Playing With Fire,” “DontGetIt”

-Archibald

(That was an awful lot of words for an album that a lot of hip hop heads automatically dismiss. so you may want to double back and read the damn thing, if for nothing else but the entertainment value. Comments can be left below, as always.)