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Fighter: Lupe Fiasco

Trainer (Gym): Charles “Chilly” Patton (1st & 15th Entertainment, Atlantic Records)

Cut Men: Lupe Fiasco, DJ Dahi, The Buchanans, S1, Vohn Beatz, DJ Simonsayz, MoeZ’art, M-Phazes, Blood Diamonds, JackLNDN, Marcus Stephens

Weight Class: Lyrical Heavyweight/Conscious Rap

Notable Fire: Deliver, Mural, They.Resurrect.Over.New Feat. Ab-Soul, Prisoner 1 & 2 Feat. Ayesha Jaco

Notable Trash: Madonna Feat. Nikki Jean, No Scratches Feat. Nikki Jean

Tale of the Tape: “The improvement of understanding is for two ends: first, our own increase of knowledge; secondly, to enable us to deliver that knowledge to others.”— John Locke

If you’ve never written an album review before, understand it’s a pretty daunting task. Forget being charged with the duty of attempting to place a definitive measurement of quality on art — who is anybody to do that, really — simply comprehending everything an artist is attempting to convey to the listener without misinterpretation is basically an exercise in futility. In rap especially, artists are admired (at least they used to be) for their capacity to explore complex metaphors, double entendres and an overall cunning wit when piecing their rhymes together. If word is bond, wordplay is reverence.

Then there is Lupe Fiasco.

For all his Midwestern sensibilities and overall do-goodedness, Lupe’s raps come off to many as unnecessarily draped in sanctimony. Whether or not this criticism is warranted is up for debate, but for now, this is Lupe’s plight. He aggressively doubled-down on this criticism, through a deliberately convoluted theme, on his fifth LP Tetsuo & Youth.

The album mixes in four instrumentals representing the four seasons, but essentially, the album kicks off with the extremely expansive “Mural”— appropriately titled as the track serves as a colorful nine minute lyrical exhibition. Lupe went full Lupe on this track; the majority was impressive, some of the wordplay was filler, but the song was not without some rhyme groupings that can best be described as pure gold. Some haven’t forgotten Lupe’s contribution to the game, but many have. With all the praise surrounding Kendrick Lamar’s new album, Lupe reminds us who the man was that kept this conscious thing afloat during the trap & snap era of the mid 2000s:

“My rap position was black condition and activism/ Ammunition for abolition, missions attacking systems/ But they’re not apt to listen, unless it’s dropping on Activision.”

Part of Lu’s mission on Tetsuo & Youth was to show listeners that he was able to make a hood-friendly record, even if the hood ain’t all that friendly, and demonstrate his capacity to reach that audience. But he wasn’t about to do it without compromising his flow or his need to make one think. Perhaps this is why “Deliver” was the album’s lead single. “Deliver” offers an immediate ear-catching beat switch coming off of the lengthy party track “Chopper” (one of the better party tracks heard in awhile), and centers around the idea that his hood is so dangerous that the pizza man won’t even come around. But a second meaning develops (typical Lupe) as best described by Blk_Stn on rapgenius.com:

The Pizza Man is a symbol of deliverance. Pizza ingredients are cheese and bread, both are symbols of money.

The Pizza Man is also Lupe Fiasco, he tried to deliver food for thought, he tried to feed the minds of our ghetto people. No more. He wont give them knowledge directly like the pizza man no more. He will use other methods, the methods he used during his first two albums. Lupe’s back.

Or perhaps there’s another meaning:

Now you’re just f’ing with people, Lu.

A “deep dish” indeed, in the middle of the second verse, Lupe digs even deeper: “The ghetto was a physical manifestation/ Of hate in a place where ethnicity determines your placement/ A place that defines your station/ Remind you niggas your place is the basement/ White people in the attic/ Niggas selling dope, White people is the addicts/ White folks act like they ain’t show us how to traffic/ All that dope to China, you don’t call that trappin’?”

The rap Ken Jennings also touched on many other issues, such as his longstanding beef with Atlantic Records (“Dots & Lines”), the prison system (“Prisoner 1 & 2”), religion (“Little Death”/”Adoration Of The Magi”) and…about a thousand other topics, as Lupe is prone to do. Sonically, the album didn’t contain one singularly memorable beat, rather a slew of jazz influenced (if not infused) instrumentals mixed with a few rugged anthems for the hood scholars. The juxtaposition of “Chopper” to “Little Death” shows off some of Lupe’s flexibility, as his rhyme scheme and delivery matched each of these tracks appropriately.

Overall, Tetsuo & Youth probably did more for RapGenius than it did Lupe Fiasco. While RapGenius is a dope site, some of its stewards in charge of the annotations can occasionally get into a pissing contest (in other words, trying to outsmart the internet), resulting in extreme reaches for definitions. With Lupe’s content providing extensive latitude in this arena, it really is nerve-racking having to rely so heavily on this particular site for understanding. Yet, that’s exactly what one is forced to do if attempting to understand Tetsuo & Youth.

Sidebar: Moreover, to give some of those annotators this type of power is a scary proposition.

Practically everything about this LP is challenging. From the hooks down to the smallest metaphors (see the explanation of the chorus on “Adoration Of The Magi” — pure dopeness), the listener is left to ponder, “Is this what he means, or is there something more to it? Or is he connecting this bar to a thought from the first verse?” It’s impossible! By turning an album into a homework assignment, Lupe’s web of wisdom can inadvertently cause the listener to rather easily forget to enjoy the music for what it is— music!

But you get the impression that this is exactly what Mr. Fiasco wants. He wants the you up at night toiling over every couplet. He wants his bars to provide mental scars. He takes pleasure in this. He lives for it! However, Lupe’s dogmatic approach to intellect within hip-hop ultimately alienates many rap fans, for better or worse. Look no further than Tetsuo & Youth debuting at #14 on the Billboard 200, with lowest first week sales of his career, as evidence of this.

Nobody is suggesting Lupe “dumb it down“, but his approach to this album and those in the future will continue to perpetuate the notion that Lupe Fiasco is more pretentious than poet. T&Y makes the intelligent feel inadequate. And who wants to feel inadequate in the comfort of their own home, car or headphones? Still, save for a couple of boring records (the Notable Trash section here is far from “trash” in the traditional sense, but just because a record is deep, doesn’t necessarily make it a great song), T&Y was yet another example of Lu’s creativity and brilliance behind the mic.

Fight Night: Winner By Eleventh Round TKO

In a way, it’s unfair to even make an attempt at encapsulating all which Lupe expounds upon on this album in this microscopic space of internet. It even seems like this review required far more big words than normally used just to do its description justice. In short, this dude is far deeper than any of us even thought. Lupe Fiasco is next level from the next level and he seems to want all hip-hop fans to “proceed to the next level”, as stated on the arcade game-influenced “They.Resurrect.Over.New“, the album’s final song.

Fitting that Lupe would end the album with a song about resurrection, following two other tracks cloaked heavily in religious themes. It’s also fitting that this trio of songs would come on the heels of  “Spring”, T&Y’s last track, as he speaks of “resurrection” right at the start of spring. He also deployed “Mural” during the “Summer” section of the album — as one is more likely to take in an art exhibit during this time of year — “Prisoners 1 & 2” and “Little Death” in the fall — when the weather begins to chill and one becomes banished to their own confines — and “Chopper” & “Deliver” during the winter — where he depicts the cold and dark realities of life in the hood. None of this appears to be an accident. What’s not an accident is Lu challenging his listeners to think (including those tasked with reviewing his music), which has always been a part of his nobility as an artist.

What Magic Johnson was to the fastbreak, Lupe Fiasco is to nerd rap. Though Tetsuo & Youth may alienate some, those who hang on for the ride are rewarded handsomely. As for the disenfranchised, it’s unlikely that Lupe will miss them. He’s never gone out of his way to make radio or Billboard-friendly music, but he’s always managed to connect with his core audience (see Lupe’s “Philosophy Sundays” on Twitter) who applaud his methods.

And maybe that’s just it. Maybe this all this is just a means to an end: Lupe Fiasco deliberately goes over the heads of 98% of listeners just to get the conversations going— just to get you thinking…

Who knows? It’s hard to tell with this guy.

A homie on social media said he didn’t like Tetsuo & Youth because he felt Lupe basically “rapped a thesaurus”. Funny, but one listen to “Mural” and you’ll see that this is also true. Lupe rapped his life on this record, or his approach to it anyway. Ten years in the game and he ain’t hung up his paint brush yet.