3.03.2008

The Top Albums of 2007: #15. Lil Wayne - Da Drought 3



#15. Lil' Wayne - Da Drought 3

While The Carter 3 may be a bit away (wait, is it? I'm confused about this still), Lil Wayne still dominated the shit out of internet geeks in 2007 with this incredible double length mixtape. You see, through his winning personality, and insane Southern milkshake he calls a voice, Lil' Wayne has revolutionized the way most rock critics see hip-hop mixtapes. Suddenly, every pretentious white-boy-music-nerd site is talking about the latest underground mixtape with a passion usually reserved for the latest Canadian post rock band. Indeed, music snobs have managed to co-opt another fine emcee into the critically acceptable canon of college-kid appproved rap.

But Da Drought 3 is undeniably great, so we can ignore this and my status as a college kid for the time being.

To put this all simply, the basic root of Da Drought 3's genius is Lil' Wayne's ability to improvise abstract, hilarious one-liners and complex conceptual metaphors with seemingly little effort.

When he observes that "bitches want to fuck like they're me and I'm them", he isn't just casually daydreaming about how much sex he has, he's playing around with the traditional power and gender roles that rap fame can bring. "N.O. Nigga", the song the quote is from, explores the duality of Lil Wayne's fame. While his fame and money are impressive, the song makes clear that LW is under constant pressure, meanwhile the (borrowed) churning, escalating beat pushes the emcee closer and closer to some sonic edge with no escape in sight.

This kind of throwaway genius is the core of the two CDs making up Da Drought 3, and it stands as a clear monument to Lil Wayne's lyrical creativity in an age of beat-heavy fluff.

Ha. It's so easy to make a Lil Wayne review unnecessarily intellectual, isn't it?

(download it here)

Nathaniel Tyson

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