It’s almost a decade since the colossal Carter III, an album which sold a groundbreaking 1 million records the first week. Weezy was at the pinnacle of Hip Hop then and the question I have is can he bring the attention back to that level?. Since the controversies with Birdman/Cash Money dating back to 2014 regarding a $51million lawsuit and the block on Carter V, it hasn’t been the same.
My objective with this post is to shine some light on Weezy, look at where we are now and what I think we need.
Weezy and the New School
The respect Lil Wayne gets from most of the new school rappers(exception Kodak Black) is unparalleled. He definitely helped popularize his dreadlocks, his dress style, and his unorthodox/impromptu rapping style. This is most visible with the likes of Lil Uzi and Young Thug, with their use of autotune and subject matter.
Young Thug in 2015 also stirred up some ill feelings initially naming his commercial debut mixtape Carter 6 (later changed Barter 6). This was also a period of time where he was transitioning away from sound exactly like Lil Wayne.
Weezy projects post-2015 -> Today
2015 was one of Lil Wayne’s most prominent years for projects with an album and two mixtapes. The Tidal exclusive, Free Weezy Album minus 3 or 4 songs stood far above No Ceilings 2 and Sorry 4 The Wait 2 mixtapes (aka I hate Birdman and Cash Money mixtape ha). The album gave us the conscious sides of Lil Wayne we aren’t exposed to often.
2016 gave us the project of throwaways, commercially known as Colegrove. This joint album with 2 Chainz lacked chemistry and without the decent Gotta Lotta didn’t have any replay value.
All the way back in January of this year we had rumors of Dedication 6, Funeral and Carter V all being on the way. We even got a similar sentiment from Birdman confirming Carter V would be out this year, but nothing has come of that yet. Maybe Martin Shkreli will just circumvent everyone and leak it like he has done with some snippets.
The nostalgia felt with the T-Wayne mixtape is short lived. It’s cool on the first listen but after few plays, it really does sound outdated. If only T-Pain and Weezy could’ve come together and cooked up some new heat.
Weezy and his features
Lil Wayne will always be known for his enormous catalogue of features, especially 2007-2009(300 songs including features!!???). In the space of those two years, Lil Wayne really broke through into the mainstream at this point and was on what felt like every remix under the sun. One of his most notable in this period is that with Destinys Child.
Two more recent features of note we’ve had are with Nicki Minaj – No Frauds and DJ Khaled – I’m the One. The problem with Weezy on both of these songs is his parts are forgettable. There aren’t really any crazy quotes we haven’t heard before, it’s just same old.
What we need
I think dropping Carter V before a mixtape would be an extremely risky move, especially with the iconic status around them. There still seems to be so much red tape around it as well.
A Sorry 4 The Wait 3? or any of the others mentioned in the project section of this post would do. Although, what I think would be ideal now opposed to Weezy bananas on everyone’s beats is some well-constructed songs!
I will wrap it with the words of Drake “Free C5, how the f*ck we got the boss waiting?”
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