I want to say that
The College Dropout reminds me of those
Fresh Prince albums when Jeff was still the DJ, and Will was the rapper but I don't want people to get caught up in that. The point I want to make is that
Kanye West fills that same void. He represents that persona that we rarely see in American pop culture. He's the middle class black kid. He's more
The Wood than
Boyz 'N The Hood. The difference between Kanye and Will, though, is that the Fresh Prince was a celebration of being that kid. That kid as cool. Kanye West's rhymes are for that kid who, in 2004, knows that in our current pop culture it's the thug that's sexy, the thug with the cars and the girls, and definitely not the kid with the backpack. He knows that and imitates it and is mad at himself for being a poseur but not having the desire or will to get hood rich nor the self-worth necessary to shake his feelings of inadequacy. He's a kind of Bizarro
Dwayne Wayne with all the insecurity and little of the focus, determination and book smarts. It's an admirable concept for an album. If only Kanye was a better rapper.
His rhymes are ragged. He has a tendency to rhyme the exact same word (ending two successive lines with "club" or "felt") and rarely taking the opportunity to play off the different meanings one word might have. He absolutely floors me with what could be a decent turn of phrase by getting
Cree Summer's name wrong, even going so far as to spell both her first and last name wrong in the liner notes. Most of the time he's trying to catch up to the beat and on every song he's outclassed by his vibrant hooks or by the guest rappers and many times, by both. Kanye is witty. The themes in every track are smart, often funny, and very timely. It's just unfortunate that he didn't spend as much time writing in his notebook as he did behind the boards.
The song production is luscious. Each track is a full-bodied funky head-nodder. He distills the power of
Lauryn Hill's best track on her disjointed unplugged album on
All Falls Down and twists an old
Marvin Gaye track on
I'll Fly Away into a song that, without Kanye's lyrics, would sound just as at home on
Donnie's
The Colored Section from last year. I could actually see
Jesus Walks making it's way to radio. It's awfully urban playlist friendly even with the heady material and the sincerity. There are a few too many skits but every actual song is just really adept hip hop. It's nice to hear such grand sounding music after spending the last two years with a lot of minimalist and electronic beats. There's nothing wrong with that but, damn, I'm on the west coast...sometimes I need a real funk record.
The standout song is
Get 'Em High. It's a simple enough concept with Kanye explaining his lack of skill with the ladies, particularly dealing with a girl he met on
blackplanet.com. It's one of the few times on the album when his rhyming is up to par. He's flowing well, he's on pace with the beat, and it's hot. He has to because
Talib Kweli and
Common are on the track and they drop some of their illest raps in a while. Common's is particularly strong and suggests that he's returned from the Electric Circus and is back to "real nigga quotes." His verse is just ridiculous and sits atop this hard driving bass line. The track is particularly of note because all three artists seem to be rapping outside their normal boxes. The conscious rappers on a track about hooking up, the lazy rapper actually putting in the effort to come correct.
I'm not sure if the sum of this album is greater than it's parts or if all the outstanding individual parts make up for the lack of great rapping by Kanye. It's a true head-nod masterpiece, I just wish that he was a better wordsmith. It's a definite shift in hip hop, though. It's most noticeable on the track that
Jay-Z guests on. Jay is an amazing rapper whose subject matter has always been a three-trick pony (money, cash, hoes). On this album, Jay-Z's posturing felt really tired for the first time. I wanted to hear him talk about something else.
If anything, Kanye West's
The College Dropout proves that you can.
