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Monday, June 9, 2008
CD review: Lil’ Wayne ‘Tha Carter III’
Lil’ Wayne
“Tha Carter III”
(Cash Money)
On “Phone Home,” between calling himself a Martian and comparing himself to E.T., Lil’ Wayne declares “they don’t make ‘em like me no more / matter fact, they never made it like me before.” He’s right. While many rappers freestyle their lyrics and even more abuse drugs, few take it to the extremes Wayne does. Throughout most of “Tha Carter III,” he is rapping without a safety net — even he’s not sure what he’ll say next. He laughs at his own jokes, as if he’s just realizing what he said; occasionally, he loses his train of thought and starts rapping about something else.
On songs like “Got Money,” a vocoder-duet with T-Pain that is destined to be a club smash, his random boasting fits perfectly. Other times, the result is a mess — on “Let the Beat Build” he wastes a great beat with absolutely nonsensical rhymes. Many critics have praised his unique style as post-modern “free association” rapping. Less charitably, he’s babbling what sounds like drug-induced nonsense.
But his recent work on the mix-tape scene blurred the line between these two distinctions — mixing his lyrical insanity with strong and powerful songwriting. It was these songs, along with his numerous feature appearances, that made the buzz for “Tha Carter III” so deafening. It’s been XXL’s most anticipated album since January 2007, and in the meanwhile, several of his mix tapes made it onto critical top 10 lists. He’s had hundreds of songs released in the past few years, and the addition of any number of them would have greatly improved “Tha Carter III.” Instead, by the end of the album, a rapper with a seemingly endless amount of lyrical creativity has a song about sleeping with a female police officer who pulls him over (“Mrs. Officer”).
The production, mostly from A-list producers such as David Banner, Just Blaze, Swizz Beatz and Kanye West, carries the album. On the suitably epic “Mr. Carter,” Jay-Z drops by for a passing of the torch, telling Wayne “that I took so much money from the rap game, now it’s your go.” But even in the digital age, albums are still an artist’s ultimate proving ground. For Wayne to claim the throne, he’ll have to leave the mix-tape game behind and do like Kanye: keep all his best stuff for himself.
Recommended: “Mr. Carter,” “Tie My Hands”
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CD Review: My Morning Jacket ‘Evil Urges’
My Morning Jacket
‘Evil Urges’ (ATO)
Consider My Morning Jacket — the very name has become a mark of quality as the Louisville outfit has snuggled into its role as rock band du jour for the “All Things Considered”-and-New Yorker crowd.
Classic guitar rock nerds who ended up indie rock scene-makers, MMJ’s fifth album is a very clear next step move, the aesthetic progression after the 2005 breakthrough “Z.” “Evil Urges,” their fifth album, is their futzing-around-with-other-genres record and as has been widely reported, their favorite new sound is Prince. (And really, who doesn’t want to be Prince?)
MMJ leader Jim James’ voice is still closer to (his obvious idol) Richard Manuel, his music closer to Crazy Horse guitar rock than the purple one’s voice or funk, but he’s able to rock a Princely squeak on the sharp title track, which assumes most evil urges are merely desires we’ve been encouraged not to indulge.
But it’s “Highly Suspicious” that longs to be a “Sign O’ the Times” B-side. James stretches his falsetto as far as it will go in the service of lyrics such as “peanut butter pudding surprise!” The Muppet-grunting on the chorus puts tongue firmly in cheek and even the guitar solo tries for Revolution-style overkill. Impressive, frankly.
In fact, the first four songs are uniformly excellent. In addition to the above, “Touch Me I’m Going To Scream,” with its electronic smears, sounds like a well-meaning Wilco tribute, but works anyway. ‘I’m Amazed” is their modernized Southern-rock at its catchiest.
James’ metier is also rock at its most medium-soft. A tendency towards the dull has been MMJ’s Achilles heel; even the band’s spaciest guitar jams feel faintly restrained. “Sec Walkin” tries to find Nixon-era soul and somehow ends up at the corner of Fogleberg in downtown Atlanta Rhythm Section.
It’s to his credit that James never quite comes off as smug, exactly, but there’s something suspect about his awe-shucks vibe. Acoustic guitar plucking out the melody, He sings about the local nerd-hot “Librarian” (“Take off those glasses and let down your hair for me”) as if he discovered the look himself.
But his many fans will forgive him. In tense and uncertain times, “Evil Urges” makes listeners feel good about themselves. That’s more than enough for most.
Recommended: “I’m Amazed,” “Evil Urges”
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Review: The Cure at Austin Music Hall
Jay Janner AMERICAN-STATESMAN
- Check out pics from the show in our Live from Austin 2008 gallery
- A-List: The Cure at Austin Music Hall
Robert Smith is old school.
The man’s been in the music business for 30+ years, smearing his lipstick, teasing his hair, fluttering his raccoon eyes and wearing large guitars and black shirts to hide his muffin-top girth longer than many of his newer fans have been alive.
So when fans have paid more than $50 for a general admission ticket in Austin Music Hall, Austin’s least pleasant venue (think bikram yoga studio), he’s going to give them their money’s worth.
Which means a three-hour show.
Yep, three hours that reached all the way back to the band’s 1978 debut “Three Imaginary Boys,” which let the band pack in a mess of new songs without sacrificing any hits. New material (“The Only One,” “the Perfect Boy”) was seamlessly integrated into sing-along alt-classics such as “Pictures of You,” “Fascination Street” and, of course, “Just Like Heaven,” simply one of the most perfect rock songs of the past 30 years.
All of this worked because, this time out, the band stripped back to a four-piece: Smith, guitarist Porl Thompson, bassist Simon Gallup and drummer Jason Cooper. The two former players have wandered in and out of the band since the beginning; the latter is a 13-year vet. No keyboards on stage, which forced Thompson to turn, say, the synth-rush of “Inbetween Days” and “Just Like Heaven” into a sharp lead.
Between them, Thompson and Gallup were present during both the Cure’s early ’80s high Goth phase (“Seventeen Seconds/”Faith”/”Pornography”) and their mid-80s biggest-mopes-in-the-world stretch (“Head on the Door”/”Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me”/”Disintegration”).
This made for a hardcore Cure nerd’s dream set list - lots of surprisingly heavy post-punk guitar thrum, light on the sugary synth-pop. There’s nothing wrong with the latter, but it was thrilling to hear the band’s proggier tendencies pared back to rock-band parameters - songs such as “Lullaby” and “Primary” are shockingly well-constructed.
And it speaks to Smith’s singular blend of tongue-in-cheek showmanship and genuine chops that he can announce a double-encore of really old material with “Come with me for a trip back through time” and not make you wanna blanch. A four-song set from “Seventeen Seconds” and a seven-song set (!!!) from “Boys Don’t Cry” followed.
In spite of brutal claustrophobia and sweltering temperatures, for the 30-somethings in the crowd for whom “Disintegration” was their generation’s “Dark Side of the Moon,” it was (sorry) just like heaven.
Click below for a full set list.
The set list:
open
fascination street
alt.end
torture
the end of the world
lovesong
the big hand
pictures of you
lullaby
catch
the perfect boy
from the edge of the deep green sea
the figurehead
a strange day
sleep when i’m dead
push
doing the unstuck
inbetween days
just like heaven
primary
the only one
signal to noise
the hanging garden
one hundred years
end
Encore:
at night
m
play for today
a forest
Encore 2:
three imaginary boys
fire in cairo
boys don’t cry
jumping someone else’s train
grinding halt
10:15 saturday night
killing an arab
