Music's 3R's 10.05.09: New Jay-Z, Lil' Wayne/Weezer Collabo, 50 Cent's Homophobic Remarks, Drake?, Kanye/Gaga Tour Off, More

Posted by Aaron Titan on 10.05.2009

From the Kanye/Lady GaGa tour being called off, 50 Cent/Lady GaGa beef, and another new Jay-Z album to new Slayer music leaking, Lil' Wayne teaming up with Weezer, and more, 411's Aaron Titan breaks down the Right, wRong, and Ridiculous from the week in music!


Slayer's New Album Cover (World Painted Blood: 11/3/09)


Greetings

Mr. Titan here. Welcome Mr./Mrs./Ms. Reader (or any combination of those preceding titles) to another rousing edition of Music 3R's. As you read this, I'll be trying to make it through a day of work after attending a Chicago Bears game the day prior or I'll be in my recliner watching the Favre try to make peace with the Packers. This weekend excursion will be my last for the foreseeable future unless the Blackhawks play a game that aligns with my schedule, so the news beats in ‘R' county should become a little more current than they've been.

I know you've all been chomping at the bit for some casual ramblings on what I've been listening to lately before we get into the meat n' potatoes of the column. Well, I've really been all over the place to be completely honest. I bought Kid Cudi's Man on the Moon: The End of Day and Jay-Z's Blueprint III and am happy with how I spent my money. I'd say that all the hip-hop I've been listening to lately has been pushing me back into the realm of rock and such this week. Hip-hop fatigue sets in on me quickly if I abandon rock for too long. I had a really random week which in turn gave me a super this n' that musical journey over the last 7 days. The most satisfying tunes I listened to this week was last Friday as I was getting ready for my workday:



The Bends, OK Computer: Both phenomenal albums in their own right, no question about it; however, I fucking love Kid A and feel it is the best Radiohead album thus far. Not stating a fact, just my opinion. I grew up fascinated with Radiohead's videos for "Karma Police" and "Paranoid Android," but when I heard Kid A, it blew my mind. "Everything in its Right Place" and "The National Anthem" are two songs that I still find new relevance in each time I hear them. It's such a beautiful album and just sounds important and entrancing upon each listen. I kind of hope Thom Yorke gets the solo shit out of his system so he can get back to bigger and better things with Radiohead.

The Column

For those unfamiliar with the 3R's concept, here's the breakdown. I will be reporting and commenting on happenings in the music world and categorizing all the hoopla into three sections: the Right, the wRong, and the Ridiculous. The Right will feature news, albums, and announcements music-related that I'm personally stoked about. The wRong will be the bad versions of all three of the aforementioned. The Ridiculous is the worst of it all, that which makes good ol' Mr. Titan shake his head in perplexing amazement.

The Right





Slayer Paints Another Mona Satan: If you don't like Slayer, you really ought to try once more. Go the fuck back up to that video and listen. It's extremely long for a Slayer song and I fuckin' love it. This is the title track off of Slayer's upcoming November 3rd release, World Painted Blood.

Here's the thing about Slayer. It's death metal but it's coherent. That's what I appreciate about this band and always have. There's a lot of heavy metal bands out there today that think it's all about making the music sound as little like actual music as humanly possible and just heavy, heavy, and heavier. Not an enjoyable art form to me personally. Sorry.

No doubt, Slayer's heavy, but I can understand the lyrics and appreciate the intricacies of just how fast and hard they're playing without sacrificing musical quality and sound. There's all these heavy metal bands out there today that have been around for a while and are kind of treading the waters of mediocrity. Did you ever wonder why Lamb of God and Mastodon multiply their fanbase on each album cycle? They make heavy fuckin' music that's linear and accessible. Slayer's been doing it longer than most and I cannot wait for World Painted Blood to swarm in on the wings of Satan's demonic minions. Oh, by the way, I'm exaggerating with the Satan stuff. You can be a Slayer fan and not worship the devil. It's fun to pretend though…or something like that.



New Hova?: So Jay-Z has a new album coming out sometime in the near future. No, not Blueprint III! That one's old news already! I've already listened to it 5 times, so yeah…NEXT!

Some track that I'm starting to doubt actually exists called "Crispy Benjamins" is floating around out there and may or may not be a track to be included on some sort of greatest hits album Hova's former label Def Jam is releasing. It's got a Regina Spektor sample ("Chemo Limo") on it and sounds like a lot of fun.

Again however, I can't find it anymore. Checked YouTube. Checked several sites of varying degrees of legal/illegal music offerings. Not there. I did discover a treasure trove of DJ AM mixtapes though. Check it out here.

Honestly, I'll listen to anything Jay-Z related at least a couple times, so here's hoping Jay-Z puts out some new stuff. EPs are always fun! But hey, let me have a few more weeks to digest Blueprint III. It's a solid album despite what many are saying about it. "Forever Young" is an awesome song!



Weezy-er: Adding to the intrigue of Weezer's album (see album art above), Lil' Wayne will make an appearance on the upcoming Raditude. The track, "Can't Stop Partying," features a Wayne-contributed verse and Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo claims it's not just 20 bars laid down for the sake of novelty. Let's hope so Weezer, because your supposed die-hard fans are going to probably bitch about this more than they did about the Red Album, an album I happened to enjoy quite a bit.

This new venture on Raditude further supports the claim a made a few weeks back. Weezer is a fun band and isn't going to light hearts on fire like they did with the Blue Album fuckin' 15 years ago. Jump on board with it or go find some take-myself-too-seriously acoustic guitar playing band to fondle yourself to. Let the rest of us bump some Weezy-er, OK? OK! To commemorate this upcoming album and sure to be fun song, give this a whirl:





Ramones Biopic: There is a Ramones biopic picture in the works and I'm pumped about it. Fox Searchlight is starting a treatment for the upcoming book "I Slept With Joey Ramone" by Joey's brother Mickey Leigh. The book itself comes out in December, but the movie would come out much, much later given all the difficulties involved in securing music rights and such. I mean, how can we have a Ramones movie without Ramones tunes?

The movie, if it gets the greenlight, will supposedly focus on the Ramones story with emphasis on frontman Joey Ramone. I've always loved The Ramones and think their story needs to be told. I mean, there's some great stories there, like how the song " 53rd & 3rd" is about when bassist Dee Dee Ramone was a male prostitute on the title New York City intersection to support his heroin addiction.





The wrong





50 Cents Worth of Homophobia: Recently, rapper 50 Cent referred to the Kanye/Lady Gaga "Fame Kills Tour" as "the gay tour." No doubt 50 Cent still has beef with Kanye after their Billboard Charts showdown in 2007. For those that don't remember, Kanye West slated his 3rd album Graduation the same day 50 picked for his sophomore joint Curtis. 50 Cent went on record before the release date duel saying he'd retire if Kanye West outsold him. Well, Kanye pushed about 900,000 units during that first week and beat out his rival by...oh, I don't know...like 400,000 units, give or take.

First off all, should 50 Cent really be stirring up the pot of metaphorical shit about Kanye STILL? Clearly he got punked out last time he ran his mouth. Now he's just picking what is most likely the lowest point of the career of one Kanye West to make himself look stronger for his new album where he's probably still talking about getting shot a bunch of times, running some sort of candy shop, and being gangster. Given he's got mentors like Eminem and Dr. Dre, why does 50 Cent suck so much? Beats me!



And the plot thickens. Lady Gaga commented on 50's comments after he issues an apology statement for his clearly offensive comments:

"I think it's sad — and I think that nobody in any genre of music should accommodate homophobia."

True that! I've been really impressed with Lady Gaga and think she has a long and prosperous career ahead of her. That said, the reason I agree with her isn't because I happen to appreciate her talents or that I'm not a 50 Cent fan. I just feel that it's extremely ignorant to call something "gay" because you don't like it. What 50 Cent did (which is sadly still a common way of speaking these days) is use a term to embody something negative that an entire population of human beings use to identify themselves. Not cool man. Not cool. Tangent over...now.

Who the Fuck is Drake and Why is He Such Hot Shit?: A commentary from Aaron Titan, rather than new news, I'd like to talk about this Drake guy that's been gaining a great amount of popularity lately. Now personally, I don't listen to the radio, so I didn't really here than "Best I Ever Had" song he put out until I watched the VMAs a few weeks ago. Technically, only the CD player in my car works, so yeah... Also, MTV doesn't play videos except for on the VMAs (and I don't watch MTV anymore since it turned into a shitty high school reality show channel), so again, hadn't really heard it.

My first impression since I heard that "hit:" eh... I mean, his "Forever" track with Kanye, Wayne, and Eminem is OK, but he's not the hottest shit on the planet like everybody's acting like he is. Honestly, I thought Eminem completely murdered his verse on that track. Check it out below and see if you agree.





But now, this motherfucker has an album coming out in the first quarter of 2010 that everyone in the hip-hop world can't wait to hear. Why? Half of what I've heard from this guy is some weak auto-tune crooning. Didn't Jay-Z come through and kill that shit a few weeks ago anyways? I digress.

Anybody can auto-tune, so that's not what makes him a big deal. Cher did it over 10 years ago ("Believe"). He's a decent MC when he raps, but aren't musicians supposed to earn their credibility? I mean, fuck, Metallica played club shows in San Francisco for quite a while before they became one of the biggest arena acts of all time. They didn't get the rockstar treatment immediately like this guy is. Earn your keep Drake. Earn your keep.

The Ridiculous

Kanye/Gaga Tour Off: Just days after his incident with Taylor Swift at the MTV VMAs, Kanye West announced an arena co-headlining co-headlining tour with Lady Gaga. The two have collaborated in the past on Kid Cudi's new album, so it definitely seemed like a fit. Lady Gaga is clearly into fashion and Kanye…well, going from straight-up rhymes like "Through the Wire" to auto-tune flamboyance and Paris shopping trips…well let's just say the two could have shared some outfits on tour.

So now the tour's completely off. Let the speculation begin!

Honestly, I was skeptical of it selling well. Mid-sized arenas would've done just fine, but trying to put a decent amount of asses in the seats of arenas that major sports teams call home? Yeah, Kanye did it before with the Glow in the Dark Tour, but that was before he literally became the villain of show business. Yeah, he'd been a dick before in the past, but for some reason, the public really just went batshit pissed off on him.

The circumstances are really quite intriguing in this. I mean, had he pulled this stunt if someone like Katy Perry had won and Kanye had done the same thing, I just can't see it having been as big a deal. Think about it. Taylor Swift: 19 years old, blonde, country singer, American as apple fuckin' pie, sweet, innocent, etc… Her name is announced as the lucky recipient of the moonman for BEST FEMALE VIDEO of the year. The camera gives us the close-up of her truly shocked face. This is the biggest moment of her budding career. She takes centers stage, accolades giving her recognition she's worked so hard for. This is her moment.

Then Captain Buzzkill storms the scene:

"BEYONCE HAD ONE OF THE BEST VIDEOS OF ALL TIME!"

He flips off the crowd. Taylor Swift is speechless…and she's supposed to be delivering an acceptance SPEECH! Moment is ruined. Beyonce clearly isn't impressed with a guy trying to be her knight in shining armor, saving her when she's already got to pay her maid overtime to dust the VMAs she's already got piled up at home. Her husband is calling Kanye:

"Motherfucker, I know you produced my new album and shit, but that's where the working relationship ends. You're not working for me anymore. I didn't hire you to defend my wife and make that poor girl Taylor Swift cry. OK? So I've gotta' go brush my shoulders off and solve like 93 more problems - my bitch not being one of them. Talk to you later asshole."

OK, so all this shit goes down. Kanye's reps are telling him the tour should still be on. Lots of people have been working on it, Lady Gaga's going to get mad press for the VMAs which will only help the tour sell tickets, money's already been spent, so let's just soldier on. Any press is good press, right?

I kind of suspected all along that this tour wouldn't get on its legs at all after such a media backlash. Kanye West was kind of always somewhat of a douche before this, but he still made pretty awesome music, so we forgave him. Graduation is an amazing album musically, say what you will about the person who created it. 808s kind of sucked but "Love Lockdown" was fun, so again, we forgave him. Now, after the VMA stuff, I think it's safe to say I've had enough Kanye West for quite a while. Therefore, even though I consider myself a fan of his music, why would I want to throw away 40-100 bones on a ticket to see him in person? I mean, based on the experiences of those I see on TV, being in the same room as Kanye West isn't really that much fun. I'm sure I wasn't the only one that wanted to delete my KW MP3s that night after seeing the incident in question (though let's face it, we'd all go download "Jesus Walks" sooner or later).

Here's what'll happen: Kanye West is going to finally lay low for a while. He'll let his image recover over time and in the meantime, he'll cook up some hits in the beat laboratory and most likely return to being a real MC. When the public has had time to work up some semblance of forgiveness toward ‘Ye, he'll drop his new album and have a ton of sick guest spots on it. It'll be one raucous affair of an album and headlines everywhere will read with some version of "Kanye's Back and Better Than Ever"; that is, except for here on 411's Music 3R's where my heading will read "Fuckin' Told You So". Britney Spears did the same shit, substituting continual public embarrassment and substance abuse problems for utter arrogance and scaring the shit out of Taylor Swift of course. Now everybody loves her again and are acting like they thought she'd always be back and better than she ever was. Yeah, right, sure you did!

Hasta Luego
And...wait for it........................CUT! Another Music 3R's in the books. Righteously, this is where I make my exit and you get the opportunity to voice your opinion below. Take care and stay warm. It's chilly out there. Cheers!