September 10th 2001, 11:30pm. I’m standing in line with my homie Cello in front of Tower Records in Philadelphia. We’re in line for Jay-Z’s The Blueprint. It doesn’t matter that we’ve had the bootleg since last week. We’re rabid, hungry, hip hop loving motherfuckers on a mission. The goal, to own the actual CD. That little disc, the album art, the case that sometimes came in different colors, that was music for me. It wasn’t going on the fucking computer and waiting ten minutes for a torrent to download, music was not just the song; it was the physical object in your hand. Those days are nearly gone, but until the day I can no longer physically walk into a store and buy a CD, I’ll continue to buy music that way. The thing is, most music sucks, so unless I trust an artist I do download and preview before dropping $11 on it. Listen to myself, I wipe my ass with $11 dollars yet I won’t hand it over to Waka Flocka off the strength that I don’t trust the music industry? That’s a sad way to be.
On Monday aka Pink Friday, I will be at some STORE that still sells CDs, and I will buy a copy of Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday. And the feeling I will have with that CD in my hands will be greater than the feeling I had walking out of Tower Records at 12:05am on September 11th 2001. You see with the Blue Print I knew what I was getting. I have not listened to any song off of Pink Friday with the exception of the singles. The shit’s all over the internet, I heard two cars playing songs while driving earlier today, but I will not preview it. I want that old school feeling of popping something in the way it was supposed to be listened to, not burned on some cheap ass CD-R, but from the mastered retail disc. Okay, I’m doing all of this—but what if it sucks?
Remember the Phantom Menace? Unless you’re as geeky as me, the answer is no. Star Wars The Phantom Menace came out in 1999, people lined the streets, camped out for weeks, just to be the first to say “I saw it”. No one actually thought to say, “Suppose it sucks”. It didn’t matter. It was Star Wars! Well guess what… it’s one of the worst fucking movies ever made. I mean EVER! But I saw it twice in the theater and like every one else, didn’t admit how bad it was until a year later. Now “Phantom Menace” is synonymous with Over-hype.
I love Nicki Minaj. The voices, the punch lines, I get it. I’ve gotten it for the past 3 years. Sucker free was my shit, Beam Me Up Scotty blew me away, and every new feature had me listening multiple times to catch her lines. Her flow is vicious! I defend Nicki to any and every one because i think those who don’t like her haven’t given her a chance. The girls who don’t understand rap and only listens to hooks and find her lyrics annoying, they don’t get how rare it is to hear some one that looks like a model spit like Fabolous, and she writes it BY HER SELF. The hip hop heads who slobber on Wiz Khalifa and Kid Cudi’s ball sacks don’t get that Rap is a business and songs like “Check It Out” will bang in Holland, Germany, and Abu Dhabi for years to come, assuring that Nicki will never have to do shows in 40 person capacity clubs like Cannabis in order to pay the mortgage. Then there are the misogynistic niggas who love goon music and think rap starts with Jeezy and ends with Rick Ross. Them niggas don’t buy music from anyone except the bootleg man so who gives a fuck what they think about her. Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne, and Drake are the holy trinity of rap right now, and it’s not a coincidence that all three are hated– they’re not overrated, they’re just over your head.
Fuck Lauren Hill:Don’t ever throw Lauren Hill is the G.O.A.T in my face. We all loved The Miseducation album, but it wasn’t for her fucking 16 bars of Hot “Dylon” fire. It was for her semi-off key from the gut singing and personal song writing. The shit was R&B. Ke$ha did more rapping on her CD than Lauren Hill did on Miseducation, so stop this L-Boogie worship, it’s played and has no relevance. “But dude she plays her enemies like a game of chess” and Gza swings swords that will lyrically blind a man—I don’t give a fuck about your metaphors and similes god that’s a different era… word life.
Fuck Lil Kim:Hardcore is the best CD from a female rapper, no one can take Hardcore away from Kim. She owns that… well actually Biggie ghostwrote 80% of it so I guess you can put that next to his Ready to Die and Life After Death plaques. Regardless if Hardcore is officially Biggie’s CD, Kim delivered those lyrics better than Foxy could have. But one exceptional album doesn’t make you the Queen of hip hop. All of this bullshit Kim’s been saying about “This bitch needs to pay homage” and cosigning with Keyes fat ass, it sounds desperate. It’s like Johnny Unitas coming out and taking shots at Peyton Manning, you’re making an ass of yourself and your legacy. I don’t want to hear about Kim or any other rap bitch—Trina, Diamond, Eve, The Brat, Shawna, Rasheeda—They are not Nicki’s peers. They aren’t in the same league.
The Ma$e Syndrome: My boy Rembrandt did a blog reviewing Pink Friday that I half read because I refuse to read anything about the album before I hear it. But I did catch the part where he compared her to Ma$e in a negative light. For those of you who don’t know what a DJ clue mixtape was—not is—was, Murder Mase was lyrically shitting on the who’s who of 90’s hip hop artist. But once his album came out the shit was softer than Kim Porter’s vaginal walls. Diddy put that commercial dick up inside Mase and stripped away all the battle raps. What was left was an R&B rapper who sold more records than anyone in hip hop who wasn’t dead. I’m not saying Nicki should dumb her shit down and become Ma$e, but if I hear Pink Friday and it’s a CD for the bitches, for lack of better words, I won’t be mad at it. I just want to hear quality songs. And I don’t care what anybody says “Tell Me What You Want from Me” bodies any Radio song Jay-Z ever put out.
So what if Pink Friday is the musical equivalent to The Phantom Menace? Will I disown her, will I diss her, nope—because I fucking love Nicki Minaj just as much as I loved Cam’ron and Eminem. I watched my favorite rapper since 1998, Killa Cam, rise and fall and it broke my heart to see him become half the rapper he used to be, but I still fucks with him because he’s life family to me. You don’t stop being a fan because someone drops a dud. I want Nicki Minaj to win because she’s the 3rd nicest rapper out. Not because her ass is phat. Not because she’s pretty, I could care less about the aesthetics of a rapper—I own Amil and Beanie Segal’s CDs, two of the ugliest people ever to spit 16 bars. I don’t go crazy for the image of Nicki Minaj, I go crazy for Nicki Minaj period. If Pink Friday Sucks, I’ll admit it, but I just don’t see it happening.
Pink Friday is not a record of street life as told from someone who watched it from their bedroom window
Pink Friday is not about the rise of a local hustler turned drug kingpin
Pink Friday is not a ghostwritten male vision of what a femcee should be, one who just wants to take it in the butt and say yes yes what
Pink Friday is not trap music
Pink Friday is Nicki Minaj doing the music she wants to do and if you expected to hear gun busting, coke rap, and wet pussy rhymes then you don’t know who Nicki Minaj is. I listened to the album twice now. And here’s what I think of the 13 tracks— 2 are okay. 8 are hot—3 are horrible. I could sit and nitpick for days about how the Rihanna assisted “Fly” is akin to listening to two blind zebras trying to fuck for 3 minutes and how the deluxe versions are overkill padded with throwaway songs (16 (target), 17(itunes), 18(bestbuy)) or that how “Girls Fall Like Dominos” should have made the disc in place of the horrendous “Here I am”, but who cares. Most of songs that are on the disc succeed. Does the bitch sing too much, does she dumb down her lyrics on the more commercial tracks, yes she does. Am I mad at it? Not really because those songs aren’t for hip hop heads, it’s meant to be more accessible, a nice flow until the chorus hits—that’s Pop music. Over here is Rap (wave to bum bitches like Foxy, Trina, and Alcoholic Eve) over there is Pop music (take pictures of Fergie, Ke$ha, and GaGa). I don’t knock Cash Money, Universal, or Nicki for aiming higher than that dead ass genre.
At the same time, if you are a fan, and were expecting Beam Me Up Scotty, I feel your pain, but Nicki can spit battle raps all day and as soon as Lil Kim finds someone to ghostwrite her response to Roman’s Revenge you’ll get another Nicki minaj mixtape just for the niggas. “Did it on’em” paired with “Roman’s Revenge” proves that old M.a.$.E motto of “I think I should warn you, I get hard when I want to”.
Nicki and Drake made me proud this year, they took the game by storm and then said, “we’re not going to make nigga music just because you think that’s what hip hop still is, we’re just going to make music– period” they both sung, went off on topics that really weren’t topics, and picked softer beats than expected—but guess what? Both albums are better than Rick Ross’s and the Clipse long winded coke fueled LPs. At the end of the day those two are confident in going LEFT with their music because rap is so easy for them, you put Nicki or Drake on the same song with anyone besides Wayne or Em, and they will demolish them, so why would they go through the motions of making the same types of songs every other rapper makes?
My Biggest beef is that Nicki didn’t suck one dick or rap about sex like the stereotypical female rapper… I’m upset about that, seriously I am. She could have thrown me one song about getting piped or eating coochie, but I respect that omission given the amount of little girls that listen to her, but next album I need some golden shower and lesbianism.
Rating: 4 mics.