Lil B is Gritty
Some of us are born to cast off reality for long enough to find delicious, free music (for instance, by listening to NPR’s All Song Considered podcast every week for three years).
And some of us are those people’s regular blog subscribers, such as my kind readers, who should feel free to write me an email (B/r/o/w/n/b/o/u/r/n/e a/t h/o/t/m/a/i/l d/o/t c/o/m) with whatever content they would like to see posted on this blog. Case in point: Big shouts to my man Broooklyn Z (pronounced: Bruh-eauk-lyn, Zee) who wants us us all to remember what viral democracy means to Iranians (check out the comment board). If the Brooklyn Chapter of the Complete Man Institute blows up and wants to start a Fellowship Program, feel free to advertise here.
Anyway, you gotta check out Pittsburgh rapper Lil B (free mixtape). While he certainly isn’t a threat to Lil Wayne’s niche market, the two artists share more than just a stage name prefix. They both dig deep into elemental, visceral imagery. Lil Wayne talks about his own feces all the time; even in hit singles, like Wayne’s classic “Mr. Carter” in which Brooklyn Phenom Jay-Z refers to Wayne as his “heir” (Lyrical Exhibit A: “…while all y’all [expletive] [really bad expletive] been on the same [feces], I flush/and it watch it go down the drain quick/Two words you’ll never here:/Wayne quit”).
In a similarly Jurassic vein, Lil B blurs the line between kicking it “free style” and grunting into the microphone semi-rhythmically. At one point in the mixtape linked above, he even shouts “Go[expletive] Crazy Go” over and over. You won’t know whether to fancy him an overzealous slam poet/producer like Kanye (see video below), or merely somebody who needs some help (and some days off).
Listening to Lil B reminds me of the lyrics from Counting Crows, Long December (video): “I try to tell myself to hold on/to these moments as they pass….alright, hey, so maybe there’s no way for Lil B NOT to scare older, middle class white people. I tried.
Back to it. Lil B takes Eminem’s mix of mania and meaning and straps it onto a sound even harder than 50 Cent’s (he’s a fan of both artists). A lyrical tyrant, he realizes the only way to compete for the iPodded, subway commuter’s attention is to pop with grit and push the envelope. Listen close. You might witness exactly what makes me hear in Lil B a shot across the bow of K’naan’s brand of high-minded conscious hip hop (free mixtape). Lil B’s delivery is pretty alluring, but damn though, one might say, why can’t this guy tack up a refrain every now and again, just to let me digest. Well, one, Lil B. is just that raw.
Again, you can download Lil B’s mixtape for free here.
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