Thursday, September 03, 2009
Why The Blueprint 3 album doesn't work!
Here's Hov talking to MTV about how he's already working on his next 'experimental' album:
I played The Blueprint 3 again last night and it finally struck me what's wrong with it. First of all, the album ain't that bad but by Jay standards, its a miss. And I think its a miss 'cos Jay has lost sight of who he really is as an artist. It's not the album that's wrong, it's Jay - this is not the kind of album he should be making.
Dude talks about how he wants to evolve and become a musician that can be experimental and indulge his creative 'muse' & left-field ideas but he's not that dude. Hov, you're a Brooklyn hustler who can spit that slick NY sh-t over classic, traditional beats. You've never been a trendsetter as far music goes beyond being one of the first NYC cats to really f-ck with regional producers (Rick Rock) and artists (UGK) and frankly, based on your interviews you don't have that interesting an outlook on music.
Like I said last night on twitter, if Lupe was spitting over these same BP3 beats, everyone would be going crazy saying how hot the album was. Hov can go to all the Grizzly Bear shows he likes but trying to make music of that ilk ain't really him and when he talks about loving this kind of music, I don't believe him, he needs more people. And you can tell from the album too 'cos he just doesn't sound either comfortable or convincing rapping over a lot of these really left-field sounds. Frankly the fact that he's BFFs with Coldplay's Chris Martin and thinks making music with him or doing a 'mash-up album' with Linkin Park proves he's a musical genre- breaker pretty much says it all and all the trying-to-dress-like-Ye in the world ain't gonna change that either.
As far as true musical experimentation & eclecticism goes, Hov should leave it to the people who live and breathe that sh-t like Pharrell, 3-Stacks and Kanye. But there's nothing wrong being the greatest hip hop classicist of all time. Hov was built to tear up knockin' boom bap beats. The sooner he gets back to doing that, the better for him and his fans. Raekwon finally understood this principle and I think that's why, by contrast to BP3, the Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. II album is receiving a rapturous critical and fan response. BTW: On some levels, I think Common falls into this same box too, truth be told.
[video via Nah Right]
Tweet
I played The Blueprint 3 again last night and it finally struck me what's wrong with it. First of all, the album ain't that bad but by Jay standards, its a miss. And I think its a miss 'cos Jay has lost sight of who he really is as an artist. It's not the album that's wrong, it's Jay - this is not the kind of album he should be making.
Dude talks about how he wants to evolve and become a musician that can be experimental and indulge his creative 'muse' & left-field ideas but he's not that dude. Hov, you're a Brooklyn hustler who can spit that slick NY sh-t over classic, traditional beats. You've never been a trendsetter as far music goes beyond being one of the first NYC cats to really f-ck with regional producers (Rick Rock) and artists (UGK) and frankly, based on your interviews you don't have that interesting an outlook on music.
Like I said last night on twitter, if Lupe was spitting over these same BP3 beats, everyone would be going crazy saying how hot the album was. Hov can go to all the Grizzly Bear shows he likes but trying to make music of that ilk ain't really him and when he talks about loving this kind of music, I don't believe him, he needs more people. And you can tell from the album too 'cos he just doesn't sound either comfortable or convincing rapping over a lot of these really left-field sounds. Frankly the fact that he's BFFs with Coldplay's Chris Martin and thinks making music with him or doing a 'mash-up album' with Linkin Park proves he's a musical genre- breaker pretty much says it all and all the trying-to-dress-like-Ye in the world ain't gonna change that either.
As far as true musical experimentation & eclecticism goes, Hov should leave it to the people who live and breathe that sh-t like Pharrell, 3-Stacks and Kanye. But there's nothing wrong being the greatest hip hop classicist of all time. Hov was built to tear up knockin' boom bap beats. The sooner he gets back to doing that, the better for him and his fans. Raekwon finally understood this principle and I think that's why, by contrast to BP3, the Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. II album is receiving a rapturous critical and fan response. BTW: On some levels, I think Common falls into this same box too, truth be told.
[video via Nah Right]
