KELEFA on TI: "tepid"
rootlesscosmo
12,848 Posts
Big Things Poppin = "tepid [/b]" 
July 3, 2007Music | T. I.In Rap, Inner War Can Be a Trap By KELEFA SANNEHT. I. is hardly the first successful rapper to come down with split-personality disorder. Eminem made millions by pitting the tormented Marshall Mathers against the mischievous Slim Shady. Tupac Shakur morphed into Makaveli when he made his final album. Jay-Z briefly retired from rapping to become a record executive known as Shawn Carter. (???Back to Shawn Carter the hustler ??? Jay-Z is dead,??? as he once put it.) Q-Tip begat Kamaal the Abstract; Nelly split his third album into ???Sweat??? and ???Suit??? discs; Ice Cube split one album into ???Life??? and ???Death,??? another into ???War??? and ???Peace.??? Often, successful rappers don???t crumble; they splinter.So now it???s T. I.???s turn. Last year he released his glorious fourth album, ???King???: a thunderous disc full of virtuoso rhymes that became the top-selling rap album of 2006. (Though, to be honest, there was scant competition.) Last week the follow-up, the disappointing ???T. I. vs. T. I. P.,??? arrived on the Internet, illegal but ubiquitous; the official version arrives in shops today, from Atlantic Records. Fans can choose their cover: a pinstriped T. I. or a sweatshirted T. I. P. But the music is the same, and so is the face, plus or minus a scowl.This splintering began when T. I. was Clifford Harris, a skinny hustler from the Bankhead neighborhood in Atlanta. As a boy he was known as Tip, which became T. I. P. after he started rapping, and then T. I. after he got a major record deal. In 2003 he released his second album, ???Trap Muzik,??? which included ???T. I. vs. T. I. P.,??? the song that gave his new album its title. Even then, T. I., the ambitious hip-hop star, was trying to tame T. I. P., the impetuous kid from Bankhead.In 2004, just as ???Trap Muzik??? was exploding, T. I. went to prison for violating his probation (he had been convicted of a drug charge in 1998); thanks to a work-release program, he was back within a few months. And on June 24 he reportedly got into a fight with Ludacris???s manager, Chaka Zulu; T. I. and Ludacris had previously feuded and reconciled, or so it seemed. Apparently T. I. P. just won???t stay gone.Even so, T. I. has clearly grown more comfortable in his role as a bankable star. Like any rapper aiming for world domination, he has a record label (Grand Hustle) and a budding film career (he played the lead role in last year???s ???ATL???). And while his new album includes plenty of rhymes about the good times and bad deeds, it also includes ???Help Is Coming,??? in which he tries to reassure nervous Atlantic executives. This is the hip-hop equivalent of a PowerPoint presentation: ???They say the market share???s down ??? so? I ain???t affected/Tell the label relax, and they don???t need to stress/Yeah, just cut the check and I???ll handle the rest.??? T. I. is one of the last rap stars standing, a dominant figure at a time when record sales are falling fast and hip-hop sales are falling faster. (Last year no hip-hop album, not even ???King,??? was among the 10 top-selling CDs.) And like just about every popular rapper since the 1980s, he is both a sign of the times and an anomaly. He is part of a wave of beat-savvy Southern rappers (many based in Atlanta) who have reimagined the genre over the last decade. But he???s also an old-fashioned lyricist, obsessed with verbal density; Pharrell famously said, ???He???s like the down-South Jay-Z.???You might even say that T. I. has triumphed by turning Jay-Z???s style inside out. Jay-Z knew how to hide sound in sense. His lyrics often sounded like plainspoken prose; it was only later that you noticed the hidden rhyme patterns and rhythms. By contrast, T. I. hides sense in sound. His lyrics often sound like singsong chants; it???s only later that you notice the hidden intricacy of the words.That approach was evident in ???What You Know,??? a club-crushing hit from ???King.??? While synthesizers sizzled, he used his raspy drawl to deliver a series of taunts and threats:See all that attitude???sUnnecessary, dude.You never carry tools.Not even square ??? he cube.Listeners transfixed by his entertaining interjections (???O.K.?!???) and exaggerated pronunciation might easily have overlooked the rigorous poetic construction. But that???s a neat little quatrain: four lines, six syllables apiece, each building to an trisyllabic oblique rhyme. Somehow, T. I. delivers supertechnical raps without ever sounding as boring as that last sentence.That???s why the new album is so puzzling. Compared with the reckless bombast of ???King,??? this album???s first single, ???Big Things Poppin??? (Do It),??? sounds pretty tepid. The follow-up, ???You Know What It Is,??? has a beautifully slithery beat by Wyclef Jean and his production team (which almost makes up for Mr. Jean???s faux-Jamaican patois), but the song is more elegant than thrilling. And it???s hard not to compare it with last year???s ???What You Know,??? especially since the title includes the same three words.Thus the personality split: it???s a tool that rappers often use when they find themselves getting too complacent, or too self-conscious, or both. Scrappiness used to be one of T. I.???s greatest assets, and he made his name with brash street tales, many of which revolved around the cocaine trade. (On an early mixtape, he announced, ???I got a thick, rich mixed bitch, handling bricks/And a quick-witted slick clique to manage the chick.???) He cleans up nice, but he needs someone to do his dirty work.So he brought back T. I. P., who takes over ???Act I,??? as he calls it. That???s where you???ll find those first two singles, as well as ???Hurt,??? a surprisingly strong Busta Rhymes collaboration (it???s refreshing to hear both of them sounding so belligerent), and ???Watch What You Say to Me,??? a laid-back (but tough-talking) track with Jay-Z. It???s also where you???ll find ???Da Dopeman,??? which might be the most depressing song on the album: you can almost hear a sigh as T. I. ??? sorry, T. I. P. ??? rehashes a subject he once seemed to relish. This is his first album without Toomp, the Atlantan who produced many of his defining hits (including ???Motivation,??? ???U Don???t Know Me??? and ???What You Know???), and Toomp???s devastating electronic tracks are sorely missed.For Act II, T. I. takes over. There are dull collaborations with Eminem (who seems to know how bored he sounds) and Nelly, along with a rote seduction song (???Don???t You Wanna Be High???) and that PowerPoint spiel. Finally it???s time for ???Act III ??? The Confrontation,??? in which our two heroes finally come face to face to hash out their differences.All this split-personality stuff is patently absurd (just try not to smirk or squirm when T. I. P. tries to get T. I.???s attention by yelling, ???Meet me at the mirror, man!???), though evidently it???s a common enough response to the impossible demands of hip-hop, which more or less requires its stars ??? even, or especially, the veterans ??? to say ridiculous things, and mean them. T. I. is 26, but all the big-name guests on this album are well over 30, and it seems as if he???s already worried about aging gracefully. At times his high-concept gamble comes close to paying off. When T. I. and T. I. P. square off in the second verse of ???Respect This Hustle,??? it???s worth the wait. T. I. P. complains that people are talking about him, but T. I. urges him to interpret that as a sign of respect:T. I.: ???Don???t take it personal ??? people wanna be close to folk/What you think the television and the posters fo???????T. I. P.: ??
?Man, I???m claustrophobic.???T. I.: ???Well, you need to see a doctor fo??? it/And I ain???t jokin??? ??? you close, Tip, and you ???bout to blow it.???In the end, though, clever plotting and sharp dialogue aren???t enough, especially not without more exciting beats than these. What???s missing, most of all, is the savage glee with which T. I. once attacked his foe Lil??? Flip, unleashing a torrent of insults that effectively ended Lil??? Flip???s career. The album???s three acts make the division too clear; separating the tycoon from the troublemaker diminishes them both.No matter what happens with this album, T. I.???s career is nowhere near done; he remains one of the best and slickest rappers alive, and even hearing him spin his wheels is a joy. But what comes next? How does the self-proclaimed ???King of the South??? raise the stakes? That???s one question that the hotheaded T. I. P. can???t answer, and neither can Jay-Z, Nelly, Mr. Jean, Busta Rhymes or Eminem. T. I. will have to figure it out by himself.
July 3, 2007Music | T. I.In Rap, Inner War Can Be a Trap By KELEFA SANNEHT. I. is hardly the first successful rapper to come down with split-personality disorder. Eminem made millions by pitting the tormented Marshall Mathers against the mischievous Slim Shady. Tupac Shakur morphed into Makaveli when he made his final album. Jay-Z briefly retired from rapping to become a record executive known as Shawn Carter. (???Back to Shawn Carter the hustler ??? Jay-Z is dead,??? as he once put it.) Q-Tip begat Kamaal the Abstract; Nelly split his third album into ???Sweat??? and ???Suit??? discs; Ice Cube split one album into ???Life??? and ???Death,??? another into ???War??? and ???Peace.??? Often, successful rappers don???t crumble; they splinter.So now it???s T. I.???s turn. Last year he released his glorious fourth album, ???King???: a thunderous disc full of virtuoso rhymes that became the top-selling rap album of 2006. (Though, to be honest, there was scant competition.) Last week the follow-up, the disappointing ???T. I. vs. T. I. P.,??? arrived on the Internet, illegal but ubiquitous; the official version arrives in shops today, from Atlantic Records. Fans can choose their cover: a pinstriped T. I. or a sweatshirted T. I. P. But the music is the same, and so is the face, plus or minus a scowl.This splintering began when T. I. was Clifford Harris, a skinny hustler from the Bankhead neighborhood in Atlanta. As a boy he was known as Tip, which became T. I. P. after he started rapping, and then T. I. after he got a major record deal. In 2003 he released his second album, ???Trap Muzik,??? which included ???T. I. vs. T. I. P.,??? the song that gave his new album its title. Even then, T. I., the ambitious hip-hop star, was trying to tame T. I. P., the impetuous kid from Bankhead.In 2004, just as ???Trap Muzik??? was exploding, T. I. went to prison for violating his probation (he had been convicted of a drug charge in 1998); thanks to a work-release program, he was back within a few months. And on June 24 he reportedly got into a fight with Ludacris???s manager, Chaka Zulu; T. I. and Ludacris had previously feuded and reconciled, or so it seemed. Apparently T. I. P. just won???t stay gone.Even so, T. I. has clearly grown more comfortable in his role as a bankable star. Like any rapper aiming for world domination, he has a record label (Grand Hustle) and a budding film career (he played the lead role in last year???s ???ATL???). And while his new album includes plenty of rhymes about the good times and bad deeds, it also includes ???Help Is Coming,??? in which he tries to reassure nervous Atlantic executives. This is the hip-hop equivalent of a PowerPoint presentation: ???They say the market share???s down ??? so? I ain???t affected/Tell the label relax, and they don???t need to stress/Yeah, just cut the check and I???ll handle the rest.??? T. I. is one of the last rap stars standing, a dominant figure at a time when record sales are falling fast and hip-hop sales are falling faster. (Last year no hip-hop album, not even ???King,??? was among the 10 top-selling CDs.) And like just about every popular rapper since the 1980s, he is both a sign of the times and an anomaly. He is part of a wave of beat-savvy Southern rappers (many based in Atlanta) who have reimagined the genre over the last decade. But he???s also an old-fashioned lyricist, obsessed with verbal density; Pharrell famously said, ???He???s like the down-South Jay-Z.???You might even say that T. I. has triumphed by turning Jay-Z???s style inside out. Jay-Z knew how to hide sound in sense. His lyrics often sounded like plainspoken prose; it was only later that you noticed the hidden rhyme patterns and rhythms. By contrast, T. I. hides sense in sound. His lyrics often sound like singsong chants; it???s only later that you notice the hidden intricacy of the words.That approach was evident in ???What You Know,??? a club-crushing hit from ???King.??? While synthesizers sizzled, he used his raspy drawl to deliver a series of taunts and threats:See all that attitude???sUnnecessary, dude.You never carry tools.Not even square ??? he cube.Listeners transfixed by his entertaining interjections (???O.K.?!???) and exaggerated pronunciation might easily have overlooked the rigorous poetic construction. But that???s a neat little quatrain: four lines, six syllables apiece, each building to an trisyllabic oblique rhyme. Somehow, T. I. delivers supertechnical raps without ever sounding as boring as that last sentence.That???s why the new album is so puzzling. Compared with the reckless bombast of ???King,??? this album???s first single, ???Big Things Poppin??? (Do It),??? sounds pretty tepid. The follow-up, ???You Know What It Is,??? has a beautifully slithery beat by Wyclef Jean and his production team (which almost makes up for Mr. Jean???s faux-Jamaican patois), but the song is more elegant than thrilling. And it???s hard not to compare it with last year???s ???What You Know,??? especially since the title includes the same three words.Thus the personality split: it???s a tool that rappers often use when they find themselves getting too complacent, or too self-conscious, or both. Scrappiness used to be one of T. I.???s greatest assets, and he made his name with brash street tales, many of which revolved around the cocaine trade. (On an early mixtape, he announced, ???I got a thick, rich mixed bitch, handling bricks/And a quick-witted slick clique to manage the chick.???) He cleans up nice, but he needs someone to do his dirty work.So he brought back T. I. P., who takes over ???Act I,??? as he calls it. That???s where you???ll find those first two singles, as well as ???Hurt,??? a surprisingly strong Busta Rhymes collaboration (it???s refreshing to hear both of them sounding so belligerent), and ???Watch What You Say to Me,??? a laid-back (but tough-talking) track with Jay-Z. It???s also where you???ll find ???Da Dopeman,??? which might be the most depressing song on the album: you can almost hear a sigh as T. I. ??? sorry, T. I. P. ??? rehashes a subject he once seemed to relish. This is his first album without Toomp, the Atlantan who produced many of his defining hits (including ???Motivation,??? ???U Don???t Know Me??? and ???What You Know???), and Toomp???s devastating electronic tracks are sorely missed.For Act II, T. I. takes over. There are dull collaborations with Eminem (who seems to know how bored he sounds) and Nelly, along with a rote seduction song (???Don???t You Wanna Be High???) and that PowerPoint spiel. Finally it???s time for ???Act III ??? The Confrontation,??? in which our two heroes finally come face to face to hash out their differences.All this split-personality stuff is patently absurd (just try not to smirk or squirm when T. I. P. tries to get T. I.???s attention by yelling, ???Meet me at the mirror, man!???), though evidently it???s a common enough response to the impossible demands of hip-hop, which more or less requires its stars ??? even, or especially, the veterans ??? to say ridiculous things, and mean them. T. I. is 26, but all the big-name guests on this album are well over 30, and it seems as if he???s already worried about aging gracefully. At times his high-concept gamble comes close to paying off. When T. I. and T. I. P. square off in the second verse of ???Respect This Hustle,??? it???s worth the wait. T. I. P. complains that people are talking about him, but T. I. urges him to interpret that as a sign of respect:T. I.: ???Don???t take it personal ??? people wanna be close to folk/What you think the television and the posters fo???????T. I. P.: ???Man, I???m claustrophobic.???T. I.: ???Well, you need to see a doctor fo??? it/And I ain???t jokin??? ??? you close, Tip, and you ???bout to blow it.???In the end, though, clever plotting and sharp dialogue aren???t enough, especially not without more exciting beats than these. What???s missing, most of all, is the savage glee with which T. I. once attacked his foe Lil??? Flip, unleashing a torrent of insults that effectively ended Lil??? Flip???s career. The album???s three acts make the division too clear; separating the tycoon from the troublemaker diminishes them both.No matter what happens with this album, T. I.???s career is nowhere near done; he remains one of the best and slickest rappers alive, and even hearing him spin his wheels is a joy. But what comes next? How does the self-proclaimed ???King of the South??? raise the stakes? That???s one question that the hotheaded T. I. P. can???t answer, and neither can Jay-Z, Nelly, Mr. Jean, Busta Rhymes or Eminem. T. I. will have to figure it out by himself.
Comments
Really? I think Kelefa was right on point with that review. Super disapointing.
What happened?
Whatchu know bout that
ASAP
you don't know me
top back
motivation
shit even "I'm serious" was dope
the King is starting to fall off
and that wyclef schitt is just torrible
TIS TRUE
kinda true. At least it had one song i loved. I cant really get behind a single track of his new one.
What the hell happened to toomp? Or even Lil C?
Who produced alot of this garbage?
Dude, what happened to just blaze beats?
I cant say that. He sounded dope on that khaled track! I think this album is just a very sincere swing and a miss.
He did have a pretty shitty year. Best friend killed, miscarrage, other drama. It just doesnt sound like he really felt like making an album. He should have waited.
yes. that is the real question.
Yeah, he has the best verse on the track imo. I have to check the lp out..I havent even bothered since I have read so many bad reviews.
Soulstrut?
I'm still not entirely convinced that Kelefa_Sanneh isn't a Daniel_Rillz alias.
faux rillz rocks the striped shirts?
Oh jeez, are you really that mad that he dissed somebody from texas?
And dont you think its a little self important blaming the downturn in rap album sales on music journalists "not writing from the heart"? AS IF.....
Hilarious.
Shied's concept of the universe revolving around him has now been expanded to include his online enemies as also being at the universe's axis.
Please get familiar.
I didn't say lackluster sales can be blamed on lackluster journalists. I said that rap as it is right now could be a whole lot more interesting if more people were writing real shit about it.
SOOO......your thoughts on the latest t.i. turd?
Is there a secret career resurgence of the one Flipper that we are not knowing about?
theres only so much "real shit" you can write about a real "shit sandwitch" of an album.
So you think it's a stretch that Kelefa only started using the word "tepid" after it became a Soulstrut buzzword?
Also, you are way too much of a certified little dude for me to ever consider you an enemy. You're more like an annoying house fly.
As I said previously: I am waiting to hear the official release through some real speakers before commenting; I have only listened to it on my notebook thus far.
Initial impression: disappointing, yet still one of the year's better releases.
noz, please to also state an opinion other than coy shoutouts to online friends.
did anything else even come out this year?
Good albums to come out this year:
Devin
Turf Talk
Prodigy
Bone
Redman
Baby Boy da Prince
Get familar with Shied's Private Mental Cloverpatch!
oh yeah, the prodigy mixtape was hot. devin was cool.
bone? redman? really?
baby boy the prince? hmmm
Isn't that just another mixtape? I like Styles, but his tapes all sound the same--you really only need one or two.