If hipsters were leading the charge on Lil’ Wayne, they might actually have a good reason as to why they like him. The charge is led by teenagers who can’t even think of a reason why he’s good, but since he’s on the radio they think he’s the shit. Miami has been in a Lil Wayne craze for almost 2 years already and it’s getting pretty annoying. You can cycle through stations and listen to only songs with him in them.

I think he’s innovative, but he has terrible flow, and his over-use of metaphors gets pretty repetitive pretty quick.

Hopefully “hipster rap” (which needs a new name) can eclipse him and start to show people some good music. And I’m not sure about everywhere else, but in Miami this isn’t looking good

I think you make a great point about Weezy’s (frequently unacknowledged) debt to MCs like Biz, ODB, and Kool Keith- thinking of “911 is a Joke”, I would also add Flavor Flav to that list. I also agree with you that all of these artists either match or surpass Weezy in terms of skill, inventiveness, and ability to put together (or at least contribute heavily to) great albums.

But this begs the question of why none of these other artists ever receive consideration as being among the “greatest ever”, while Weezy has been the subject of such debates for the past few years. I think part of this is that most of the rappers on your list were part of a crew in which they, by virtue of their lyrical style and delivery, were designated as the “crazy/funny one”. Even though Biz Markie generally built his rep through solo albums, he was closely linked with Big Daddy Kane and Marley Marl and was more and more pigeon-holed as a novelty act after the success of “Just a Friend”. In addition, a number of these artists (Flav, ODB, and Kool Keith), match their lyrical/vocal style with erratic, off-the-chain on-stage and off-stage personas and behavior that ultimately tend to distract from the music and lead people to write them off as artists in their own right (I think Weezy runs the risk of this as well).

What is interesting is that Weezy started off in the same role during his time with the Hot Boyz (in addition to bearing the stigma that comes with being a kiddie/teen rapper), but has managed to not only hone his lyrical skills and vocal delivery, but has also been able to reposition himself as a “legitimate MC” and a massive pop superstar at the same time. As I argued in the original post, I think his ability to do all three of these things is what makes him important. His claim to be “The Best Rapper in The World”, long before anyone else considered him to be so was not just empty boasting or even law-of-attraction style wishful thinking. Rather, the move was both conceptual and strategic, rewriting what was possible for an avant garde lyricist with an unconventional voice. Judging by first-week record sales and the sheer number of “A Millie” freestyles out there, this has worked magnificently. I predict that we’re going to be seeing a lot more bizarro lyrics and unhinged, semi-melodic deliveries in the next year or so.

However, I think it is definitely an open question whether this influence will be a good thing or a bad thing in the long run. I agree with the point that you made in your discussion of Wale’s mixtape that Wayne manages to say very little of great substance in everything that he spits out over the course of CIII’s 70+ minutes. Wale definitely shows potential to surpass Wayne in the ability to combine inventive lyricism and flow with actual content, but I wouldn’t totally count Wayne out; “Georgia Bush” , “Tie My Hands”, and “Dontgetit” all indicate that Weezy is capable of heading in that direction as well. It will be interesting to watch both of them over the next few years to see if each one can push past current limitations to become even better.

But dude, the indie-rock crowd *totally did* back in the 90s! If I had five dollars for every hipster I saw wearing homemade Dr. Octagon costumes at a halloween party, I’d have… well, ten dollars. Still, while Keith never exactly cracked the mainstream, he was a pretty big deal with exactly the kind of hipsters that are leading the Lil’ Wayne charge today.

I guess that really just supports your main argument though. There’s all the more reason for these people to be making the connection between Wayne and Keith.

Granted, I’m of the opinion that albums are usually inherently superior to mixtapes but that isn’t always the case as Wale’s new mixtape proves which is basically an album in everything but name.

My main particular beef with the Weezy phenomeon isn’t just that Lil’ Wayne isn’t as traditionally great as the older generation. It’s the lack of acknowledment at best or historical ignorance at worst that Weezy’s fans and critical champions continue to refuse to make about him. Weezy isn’t re-writing the book on modern lyricism here. Weezy’s style is in great historical debt to artists like Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Biz Markie and Kool Keith. I mean ODB was doing the weirdo half-crooning and non-sequitur lyrcism 15 years prior to Weezy’s discovery of it and the fact that nobody seems to be making that connection pisses me off especially considering nobody is going to be placing ODB, Keith, or the Biz in the pantheon of great emcees any time soon. Despite the fact they all have numerous albums better than Weezy does.

I’ll give credit to Weezy bringing into the mainstream that form of avant garde lyricism but let’s not pretend that Weezy’s work is revolutionary in the slightest. At best, he’s jumping off from a obscure branch of hip hop’s DNA and doing some interesting things with it but in terms of Wayne being a revolutionary artist. He’s not. It’s not original. It’s just obscure.

Great Post by the way. Thought provoking.