So, what's next?

Whoa, approximately 1 million albums old on the first week, The Carter 3 is certainly defining today's pop-culture. Proclaimed as being classic for the past couple years created a buzz that caught fire and turned into the great Carter 3 hype. Fans weary of lackluster "hip-hop" releases from artists like Kanye's Late Registration and Jay-Z's Kingdom Come, both of which proving to be more concentrated on pop crossover appeal, had hip-hop fans looking far and between for fresh music

Then came Lil Wayne, on the heels of of a couple hot verses on mixtapes and pretty impressive performances on The Carter 1 & 2 and Like Father, Like Son, captured the ears of a hip-hop world looking for someone that would actually make an album we could enjoy. Lil Wayne was even his best publicist by constantly reminding us in his songs that he was "the best rapper alive". And guess what... we bought it.

The build up and actual release of the album was not free of drama neither. Release date push-backs for a couple years, beefs with Jay-Z, beefs with DJs releasing his album on the internet a little before the release date; this guy had us fiending to hear it already. And when we finally got it, us hip-hop fans who live hip-hop, who eat and breathe hip-hop, when we finally got to listen to the most hyped album in recent history, what did we get? Another pop album. A bad one at that.

So what's next? Young Jeezy and T.I. have big albums on the way but do they really have you excited? Big-Boi and Andre have solo albums supposedly dropping within the year but are we really checking for them that much after that Idlewild travesty? Young cats like Bishop Lamont and greats like Malice still keep me interested with hip-hop music, and if Dr. Dre really drops Detox soon I'll be copping first day. But as a whole the genre has really been sounding tired and stale as of late. Right now we're looking for someone else to carry hip-hop, but who?

Till next time,
Pops