Kid Cudi-The Anthem MixTape
Day N' Night is a good song, we get it. This mixtape from Cleveland based Kid Cudi, has a few other gems on it, along with the real fucking good Day N' Night. Tracks like Man on the Moon, Cleveland is the Reason and Embrace the Martian suggest some depth to this artist from the burning river city. I guess the Anthem mixtape is just a rerelease of "a kid named cudi" with a couple of remixes and other promotional materials (like 4 hi-res wallpapers, fuck that, thought the remix of Embrace the Martian by the Round Table Knights is totally worth while). Kid Cudi exemplifies a new direction of popular music, and Kanye West recognized this on his new album, featuring Kid Cudi on his track Welcome to Heartbreak off his newest release. Unfortunately for Kanye , Cudi fully realizes and exemplifies on his MixTapes what Kanye attempted to do on his 808's and Heartbreaks album. It must suck to have a guest on your album doing what you want to do, so much better than you do. I'm not saying that Cudi's MixTape is flawless(see track: Maui Wowie) but, its a step in a very cool direction.
MixTape Which Best Captures Who I Was in the Late 90s
Tie!
Team Teamwork-The Ocarina of Rhyme and
Wale- The MixTape About Nothing
I loved watching teevee and playing video games. I love going on computers now. But, in the late 90s, it was all video games and teevee. When i heard about Team Teamwork's mashup mixtape "The Ocarina of Rhyme", a selection of music from n64's Legend of Zelda-The Ocarina of Time with hiphop tracks laid on top, I nearly creamed my jeans. Ocarina of Time is by far one of the most stunning and exciting video games to play through, it also had a rocking soundtrack (Lonlon ranch anyone?). Featuring artists like Clipse, Dr. Dre, Slim Thug and Aesop Rock, the remixers kind of ran the gamut of recording artists to be mixed with the n64 soundtrack. While a great idea, some of the tracks don't work (Still D.R.E mixed with the sound when you open a treasure chest comes to mind first), infact the majority of the album wouldn't be that fun to listen to if it weren't for the novelty of whole thing. Clipse's Virginia mixed with the lost woods theme and Common's I used to love H.E.R mixed with the hyrule market theme shine through as the best tracks on the album.
Wale's Mixtape about Nothing is inspired by the the prolific 90s sitcom "Seinfeld", and it fucking rocks. Wale balances the silliness of the concept perfectly with making some serious powerful tracks (see track: The Kramer). The album is peppered with clips from the series as well as a guest appearance by Elaine, and a introduction featuring Michael Richard's infamous and bigoted rant. For me, Wale's Mixtape about Nothing, is one of the successfully realized downloads of the last year.
Honorable Mentions:
Mixtape Most Dedicated to Marijuana:
Wiz Khalifa's-Flight School
Strangest Fucking Voice:
Lil Boosie-Da Beginning
Sounds Most like Produced by New York Art Rocker
Theophilus London-This Charming Mixtape
Most gratuitous explosions/glass breaking/akon influenced
Kardinal Offishal- Do the Right Thing Mixtape
This will probably be my only post related to hiphop, i just don't know all that much about it.
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