State of the Radio

Well it has been two weeks since my last post. At first I blamed it
on being lazy, then i attributed it to my having to work the last
couple of weeks, and lastly, i blamed the radio for simply not
inspiring me. In hindsight, I can say I've always been lazy, so that
ain't it, i only worked 3 days last week and two this week, now
granted that is 5 more days than I worked in the past two months, but still, that can't be it. So it has got to be the radio's fault for
letting me down.


When I say the radio I mean Jam’n 94.5. As for last summer, Jam’n was a humongous disappointment, the song with the most staying power, that you were guaranteed to hear every hour on the hour, was the extraordinarily underwhelming, Make Me Better by FABO and Ne-Yo. The Timberland beat, stealing the strings from Raekwon's Rainy Dayz, is solid but the rest of the song is garbage.


On the Side: In Make Me Better Fabolous spits "stick with your entre
and get over your side" but keep in mind back in Can't Let You Go he tells it like it really is, "the entre aint as good without something
on the side." So? Rappers lie, nothing new. Also, wasn't Can't Let You go a much better song than Make Me Better? And why wasn't T-Pain in the music video or credited for singing the hook? What happened here?

The fact that Make Me Better was 2007's summer jam of the year is really depressing and when looking at Jammin 94.5's top 20 list right now, I'm not sure we are going to do much better in '08. So with a summer upon us, let's take a look at the state of the radio...

20. Diamond Girl - Ryan Leslie
Actually a decent song, really good beat, solid 50 Cent remix (never
thought I'd say that), and good move turning dime-piece into diamond girl.


19. With You - Chris Brown
Basically, Chris Brown's Irreplaceable in terms of acoustic guitar
heavy beat. Pretty rock bottom song but certainly helped Chris
Brown's movement to cement his status as a R&B superstar.

13. I Remember - Keisha Cole
This may be the most emo song I've ever heard on Jammin but Keisha actually has an amazing voice and looks extremely classy in the video which stands in sharp contrast to her BET reality show - I hope other people watch this show besides me...

12. Dey Know Rmx - Shawty Lo
Easily the best song on the countdown. Every once in a while a rapper comes out and has a voice so unique that the superstars of his time listen to it and go damn, I want to sound like that. In Dey Know, Jeezy and Luda, both attempt to mimic Shawty Lo's flow, but let's be honest only one man can boast "BIG UPS TO ALL MY HATERS!"

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On the Side: The best example of superstar rappers trying to
sound-like a new-comer I could remember in pre-Dey Know days, hard to think such a time existed, was definitely What We Do by Freeway. What We Do, for me, is easily a top 3 Roc-a-Fella song all time. The beat is definitely in Just Blaze's top 5. There isn't really a hook other than the sample. What We Do introduced Freeway to the public. The first line we ever heard from Free, is also, to me, an all time best stepping-to-the-beat-pre-rap-spoken-intro in "this shit for my kid's my...". Now, Freeway's voice, like Shawty Lo's, is so powerful that Jay-Z, maybe the best rapper of our generation, and Beanie Siegel, certainly not the best rapper of all time but still prideful in his own right, try to imitate Freeway's style. That doesn't happen too often mang...
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Dey Know certainly belongs to Shawty Lo and his verse holds its own not only with the big ups line but also with I got guns like TI, and like Kels I believe I can flizay, but young Weezie, yes, Mr. Please Say the Baby himself, Lil' Mr. I'm about to release the biggest let down of an album, takes the best line of the remix award simply for referencing a timeless video game with all my kicks fly like Liu Kang.

On the Side: Classic video game references seem to always work and for some reason, probably the large guns, Contra has recently been rap's go to video game. In Black Democrats off Da Drought 3, Juelz (whose verse tells Wayne's to go sit in the corner) boasts "still tote big guns like I was still playin Contra" Now this was easily the best Contra-reference tile Washington's DC 's Wale spit "everybody know me like the Contra code for extra men" on the Nike Boots Rmx - in which his verse also murks Weezie's.

Question: Does the referencing Contra rule-book stipulate that
you are only allowed to if you out-rap Lil' Wayne in the same song?

He Still Got It Moment: Wayne does have a maybe he still got it moment on the Nike Boots Rmx. What Wayne was known for before all the best rapper alive business was being remarkably witty and funny. On Nike Boots he spits:

naked woman rub my back
and ask me how was my night
i say bitch stay out of my business
when we fuck she say
stay out my kidneys

Comic gold while still holding up his money over bitches motto. Also, the stay out my business line really reminds me of Ross' just cause we fuck dont mean you can kiss me line. Both just truly there aint nothing personal about this lines.

6. Touch My Body - Mariah Carey
Vintage Mariah. I actually don't mind this song at all, it's pretty
catchy and I have been known to say I best not catch this flick on
YouTube but it's usually for stumbling as opposed to bagging a
superstar songstress.

5. Sexy Can I - Ray J
Have to say Trump was the first to declare this a legit song and as
far as the beat goes it certainly is. The only aspect that pisses me
off is Young Berg's swagger like he is an elite rapper and if you
ain't down to...then you can watch the tour bus go by. Now if 50 said
that fine, Young Joc, okay, I guess I could see it, but Young Berg, I
mean c'mon.

4. She Got it - 2-Pistols
Yessir.

3. What You Got - Colby Oddonis
Despised this song at first but it has grown on me, what with working 5 days out of the last two weeks and being forced to listen to Jam’n and hear it 3 times a day. I respect the song cause Colby, a
new-comer, could genuinely be pissed off by a girl playing him whereas if this came from T-Pain it would be no one plays me, I'm the shit. So I respect it, I guess...

2. Lollipop - Lil' Wayne
Like the song. Absolutely do not respect it...

1. Love in this Club - Usher ft. Jeezy

All I have to say is there needed to be an ode to not wanting to wait
til you get home or even the parking lot, to bang out. Finally we have that ode. Additionally, I think a new mandatory I Never question has been posed by Young Jeezy, cause I certainly know the next time, and every future time, I play I Never I have to ask: have you ever made love to a thug in the club with his ice on? And I want to see every girl drink.

On the side: Is keeping your ice on the rap equivalent of leaving your sox on? Or are the two unrelated?

So in conclusion, I don't have too much hope for this summer's
mainstream "urban" radio and can't really imagine any hits being more than guilty pleasures - but isn't that really what the summer is for anyhow?