Band: Lupe Fiasco
Album: Enemy of the State: A Love Story
Best song: “Angels” has the best hook, but “Yoga Flame,” “The National Anthem” and “Say Something” are all brilliant.
Worst song: I’m not completely on board with the “HP Skit.” Not sure I get it.
Lupe Fiasco came from Thornton Township High School in the south suburbs of Chicago. He was on the chess team there, as well as the Knowledge Bowl Decathlon Team.
So, I’m predisposed to like Lupe.
Nevertheless, his records are critically huge, as he has the combination of excellent technical skills and an introspective, backpack style. As with so many backpack guys, his work with most producers lacks what the more mainstream rappers have, though he’s worked a lot with fellow Chicagoan Kanye West and hitmakers the Neptunes. He doesn’t have a constant mainstream sensibility, but can bring it out when needed; “Kick, Push” is not the type of song that Kanye West would record, for example.
Which is why Enemy of the State: A Love Story is such a brilliant piece of work. Mixtapes are an inherently postmodern exercise, as they simply are overlays on other people’s material. Does Lupe do a better job of “Fireman” than Lil Wayne does? No, but he does make the song its own. Is “The National Anthem” ripe for a hip hop redo? Of course, especially because Lupe leads into the Thom Yorke chorus while rapping on top of the beat. Is “Angels” the best slow jam on a mixtape ever? I think so. Is the Lupe destroy the hook on “Say Something” better than Timbaland’s and Drake’s dopey sing-songy original (sample line: “Still hard to see me like the truth on TV/or the roof from the sidewalk/I don’t flo’, I ceiling.”)? Absolutely. Am I asking rhetorical questions because I can’t really explain why this album is so amazing?
Yes.
