Monday, August 30, 2010

Is Kid Cudi losin' his cuttin' edge?

FEED WHITE BITCHES.



I'm hip, I'm happenin'! I listen to all the cool kids new fangled music, trust me. I've been on the Kid Cudi bandwagon for quite a while now, fuck, Make Her Say is my wake up Jam and will be for quite a while. Now, as much as I LOVE Man on the Moon: End of Days, Cudi's debut album, I gotta say, after all the leaked tracks I've downloaded, I'm extremely dissapointed with what I've seen from Man on the Moon 2: Legend of Mr.Rager.

Lets get this straight, I've heard assorted tracks off the new album, and so far they've all MOSTLY disappointed when compared to the great other shit Cudi has put out. Well, before I get into this, I'm guess I'll be going off of what tracks have been officially confirmed, not ones that have merely come out, that way I won't feel like a COMPLETE asshole in judgement.

-REVOFEV: I guess the track title means Revolution of Evolution, feels far from a fucking evolution. This could possibly work as a buffer track, but as far as production values, the song uses an older sounding piano sample as the spine, but that's all it holds itself up on, no EVOfuckingLUTION in the track what-so-ever, there's some nice violin towards the latter half, but it comes in to late. And another thing that's starting to show itself, Kid Cudi is far from a great rapper, we all know that, but he really needs to show his hip-hop chops if he's gonna keep putting out albums. Really, all he does is fucking sing a chorus and some Coheed & Cambria-esque chants, it ain't bad, I just want some sort of rhyming going on. Shiiiit.

-Erase Me: This is the one track some of y'all might have heard by now, since it's the only of all the tracks to officially hit the radio so far, and I gotta say, while it is a slight grower, it ain't enough to warrant any adoration. The beat isn't too bad until you get to the chorus of this "dark, and brooding hip-hop song" where the 80's drums come out, and hair-metal chords start raping your ears, and not in a good way. The lyrics are laughably over the top and very "emotional", and once again, Cudi refuses to really rap, and would rather sing in a style reminiscent of Pursuit of Happiness. What I can give the track is that Kanye West really tears it up, bringing the cool rhyming that is sorely missing from the track. He musta called it erase me because he wanted to erase it off the final album! ZING!

-Mr.Rager: This is probably my favorite of the new tracks, with a light and fluttery twinkle to begin with, and then a nice thicker beat coming in, but never imposing itself, it always feels like the type of dreamy track Cudi knows so well, but for some reason this doesn't feel as derivative as it should. As usual though Cudi refuses to do any rapping, the kind of vocal work that made "Soundtrack 2 My Life" and "Make Her Say" so enjoyable.

So basically I can easily say that I'm not too terribly excited for the new Cudi album "Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager", I want new Kid Cudi, but not like this brosephus. I want thicker and more interesting beats, with more of a hip-hop influence. YOU'RE BLACK KID CUDI. REMEMBER THAT. (it's a joke. relax.)

Well at any rate, I've noticed that Kid Cudi has a real talent for making great tracks that never even make it onto his albums. Take his "new" kinda single, "Cudderisback", which samples Vampire Weekend, it's a great track, yet what makes it worth-while won't hasn't been seen in any of Cudi's newly released tracks. Another neat one is "All Talk" Featuring his good pal Chip Tha Ripper, and it's a nice remix using LCD Soundsystem's awesome "Dance Yrself Clean", and it has a great chorus, with an even better flow and rhyming throughout. I just wish some of those fuckin values would transfer into Cudi's new work. We'll see.

In the mean time, I'm going to pray to the ghost of J Dilla that Kid Cudi will find his edge, bring back the rhyme, the base, and the beats, without sacrificing any of that interesting flavor he's known for. - Matt

I'll leave you with the new video for Cudderisback:

3 comments:

  1. it will suck it cudi's new album isn't any good. i haven't heard any of these tracks, but he's one of the few mainstream rappers i really like. though it will make me feel pretty indie if i don't like him anymore since i live right outside of cleveland and everyone jizzes their pants over him.

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  2. I dunno mang...I might have to switch to Wheelchair Johnny's new shit if this goes bad, I need some kind of connection to the kids hip hop. Maybe Kanye will do the trick.

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  3. kanye is decent. i actually liked 808's and heartbreak a little bit.

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