snik1's Full Review: Tha Carter III [PA] by Lil Wayne
I really don’t like some of the reception that Wayne has been getting, which occasionally doesn’t even use good points when they use evidence of him being the best out right now. And I did not wanna be like one of those high school kids who bump nothing but Lil’ Wayne on their iPods (“Hey Kyle, what do you have on there? OMG THA CARTER 3 LEMME HEAR.”) But damn it, I copped it (regardless of that, I’m honestly not too interested in the two preceding Carter’s). At first, it seemed like a waste of money – from the first few songs, there was only one that I thought had good replay value. I’ve gotten exasperated to say the least with so much of what I’ve heard – on forums, from fans, from blogs, about Wayne which got me not even wanting to admit that he had skill. But Tha Carter III was one of those albums that surprised me, as one day I went onto iTunes to find out that all of a sudden it was released (either I wasn’t paying attention, or I thought it was gonna get pushed back again.) And not everything is bad – it’s an interesting album; and there are a lot of ideas from Wayne that are hard to explain in this paragraph.
ׁ Peat” starts off with a respectable beat, and it’s grown on me – Wayne has a couple of good puns and points, and even though I’m starting to think the beat is quite dope, Wayne sounds kinda hoarse and rushed and the lyrics aren’t extraordinary as he pimps himself and this album at the end of the song (although there are times in other songs he does it where it’s a lot more inappropriate, such as in “Playing With Fire”. “Mr. Carter” made me buy this album – so it deserves its kudos. It feels like something I’d bump the whole summer, with an anthemic, sick beat. Jay-Z’s verse sorta reminds me of something Andre 3000 was spit – and Wayne’s first verse is pretty dope, albeit the forced seasons pun at the end of the verse kinda bugs me/is a little overrated. Whoever found the sample (let’s check wikipedia...uh, Andrews Correa and Infamous) deserves props as it helps the emcees swagger during the hook, and even though Wayne sounds a little tantrum-ish when he rails against people “hatin’ for no reason”, he’s definitely at least solid with his performances on this song (except for what I talked about before/when he talks about his sh*t, literally). What’s interesting about it is the consensus of how Jay-Z matches up to Lil’ Wayne – I’ve heard things from “geez, he got murdered” to “how did Wayne beat Jay on this song?” However, after listening to it many times I have to say I believe that Jay probably spit a better verse – it’s hard to describe in what ways it beats out Wayne’s verse, it does stand out and makes me forget Wayne has another verse after it, both have some bouncy flows but Hov’s just seems better in a more normal way. Wayne’s last verse also implores us not to forget about him when we hear about names like Biggie and 2Pac, which is frustrating considering how much he has been compared to the latter lately.
“A Milli” has more of the unique, trademarked Wayne punchlines – which go from pretty cool/funny (”I don’t owe you like two vowels”) to really terrible (”I’m a venereal disease like a menstrual bleed” - not only is that grammatically incorrect, it’s extremely stupid. What the hell does that mean? A menstrual cycle is different than an STD – otherwise, sex wouldn’t exist on this Earth – and there’s one that’s even worse) but the background is tremendously annoying (the people who’ve reviewed this have already described it). And plus “STD” would have rhymed better with “menstrual bleed” instead. But okay...let’s get off of those cons. In ways it’s catchy but it ain’t a great single. “Got Money” isn’t anything special, but it’s a fun party track with a pretty decent T-Pain chorus about Wayne’s status and popularity; and an explosive beat. As for “Comfortable,” I prefer it to some of the other tracks with R&B influences, but it’s still a generic song. Although interestingly, he pays homage to Khia’s only hit and says that that song (you know what song) “hasn’t got old yet”. Okay. And “Phone Home”, which is later, has an annoying chorus yelled by Dre of Cool & Dre, trying to encourage listeners to do some sort of anonymous dance move modeled after Wayne (which might have even a stupider nickname than the ‘Crank That Soulja Boy’.)
“Mr. Carter” and then “Dr. Carter”? Who does [insert Lil’ Wayne nickname here] think he is, LL Cool J? Whatever. Funnily enough though, I’d say they’re close to neck-and-neck for the best song on Tha Carter III, although the latter is much better from Wayne lyrically. Wayne tries to help many aspiring (although they don’t seem that good) rappers in this song as he describes three patients who come into a sort of hip-hop clinic as mediocre artists as Weezy tries to save them. He is a doctor (obviously) who talks to a nurse about the health of each of his patients on that day, and on the first verse, triumphantly announces what it takes to be a good, creative emcee (he mentions Andre 3000 when telling them to stand out) even though he dies after. Swizz Beatz’ production is fantastic, and he is deservedly given props for it in the second verse – as at first it starts off slowly and calmly, but the drums get more complex and improves as off-kilter horns appear. The third person Wayne tries to save is hip-hop, saying there’s only one problem with it (that may have been a metaphor, may have not) and at the end the nurse tells him that he has saved it. Although what the hell does he mean with the line ”fly go hard like geese erection”? I couldn’t stop laughing. Funnily enough, while once conversing with yinyang205, he told me his opinion about Wayne: “he is to rapping what Swizz Beatz is to producing – the potential is there, but he’s bogged down by inconsistency.” So it’s incredibly ironic that this song is as great as it is.
Wayne’s talking braggadocio a lot, as he boasts about confirming “million dollar deals on his iPhone” on “Let the Beat Build”, which is pretty dope (I seem to like this more than everybody else) up until he starts with the ‘Best Rapper Alive’ stuff at the end of the song. So as the Best Rapper Alive supposedly, or B.R.A, he boasts in many of the first few songs – but eventually, everyone is going to want to feel what’s under the BRA. “Tie My Hands” reveals it – and it’s touching (is that a try at another pun? Yes and no). It’s definitely one of the best songs on here, a very pretty track (even if you could call the boardwork kind of sleepy) with a lot of heartfelt stuff from Wayne about New Orleans in his last few verses, and how the city and the people have been since Hurricane Katrina almost 3 years ago.
”And if you come from under that water then there’s fresh air
Just breathe baby, God’s got a blessing to spare
Yes, I know the process is so much stress
But it’s the progress that feels the best
Cause I came from the projects straight to success
And you’re next, so try they can’t steal your pride it’s inside
Then find it and keep on grindin’
Cause in every dark cloud there’s a silver linin’, I know...”
I was pretty wowed at this first time around, but I think now there are a few songs I prefer to it on this album. “Mrs. Officer” is sorta interesting, but also has a Bobby Valentino (did not know he was still around in the industry) chorus where after singing about a female cop, impersonates a siren on a police car. It’s not good. Anyway, the single “Lollipop” is a lot better than I thought it’d be, the chorus is hypnotizing (although you snap right out of that as soon as you hear “I’d love to touch your lovely lady lumps”) and I like the beat, but I do prefer the remix. “La La” is awful, and “Playing With Fire” has a great chorus and guitar background but Wayne wastes the first two verses topically, and only redeems it with the last, more personal verse.
“DontGetIt” at first, sounded a little too similar to Common’s “Misunderstood” (and I realize they sample the same song) and the verses were decent; but then around halfway through the (quite long song) Wayne made a very good point about how people who try to move drugs just to put their life in a better place are all of a sudden incarcerated and because of that, there isn’t enough room for criminals who really deserve to be imprisoned – and after that, he talks about the obvious danger there would be if someone was out of prison despite past charges lived near you or your family, and some nonsensical decisions that police make. And just when Wayne had me real compelled, he started talking about Al Sharpton, and then says “no homo”. C’mon man, when you want someone to take a speech you say seriously, you can’t say that. Still, he does criticize Al Sharpton and rambles a little, going on about what he’s done in the public and then tells us what his definition of humanity is (which is pretty profound.) He then just pretty much says that although everybody’s human and appreciates that Al Sharpton is a human being, still says that he doesn’t respect him. The first two verses are okay, but the spoken word is definitely the most interesting part of the song. “Lollipop (Remix)” has Kanye West opening up the song and stealing the show, and him and Weezy amusingly harmonize with their vocoders about how they’re the best in the world.
There are things that bug me about rap now, and rap listeners by extension (“Why is everyone saying that it’s bad just because it’s commercial?!?!” – I do not think there are too many writers here who adhere to that). Honestly, Wayne’ll never be one of my big influences. There are times he can come great lyrically, but there’s a lot of annoying gimmicks that he has on this album that get tiring (the sh*t metaphors/references, his forced punches that have sounded a lot better coming out of the mouths of other emcees, etc) and of course, although many of the things I’ve read on the Internet about him/this album you have to take several grains of salt while you read (“This is the best album to come out in most of your guys’ lifetimes” was something I found on iTunes – first of all, how old is the guy who wrote this?) There are too many arguments about how much style matters these days; and I still wouldn’t say that Wayne is a great rapper. But there weren’t any collaborations with Hurricane Chris, Jibbs, or Enrique Iglesias – so thank God for that.
Great Music to Play While: wondering when Wayne’s wacky word pronunciation gimmick will stop
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