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Scores of leaks meant that fans got both the final version of the album and the scraps that were left on the cutting room floor, for better and for worse. Unfortunately, what made Wayne such an intriguing artist is also what held back Tha Carter III from becoming the crown jewel of Wayne's album catalog (that would be Tha Carter II). Wayne still needed to fill an entire disc with his unique, scatterbrained approach, rapidly shifting between tones, moods, and sonic thumbprints. Of course, two singles do not make for a classic album. In the minds of many, Wayne was propped up to such a lofty status by all those downloads, by the CD-Rs with his name sprawled across them in Sharpie, and by the word of mouth that helped them spread from car rides around the hood to house parties that had people asking, “Yo, what is this?” after Wayne spazzed over an instrumental that belonged to someone else. This was a fanbase that was cultivated through the Sqad, Drought, and Dedication mixtapes that resided in the recesses of DatPiff and ZShare and spindles of burnt CDs. Fans felt like they had a hand in his success-in their success. Filled with bold, entertaining wordplay and plenty of well-executed, left-field ideas, Tha Carter III should be considered as a wild, somewhat difficult child of Weezy's magnum opus in motion, one that allows the listener an exhilarating and unapologetic taste of artistic freedom.More than anything, Wayne’s ascension to becoming one of the biggest and best musicians in the world worked because it felt organic and homegrown. You can fault him for not connecting enough on the album and further complicating his unmanageable body of work with this disjointed effort, but Wayne's true masterpiece is the bigger picture and how he's flipped the script since the first Carter rolled out. As the track flows from political commentary ("My whole city's underwater, some people still floatin'/And they wonderin' why black people still votin'/Cuz your President's still chokin'") to despair and onto some moving "keep your head up"-styled verse, it proves Wayne can go deep and connect with his audience if he chooses. Just like on Tha Carter II, Robin Thicke ends up the most complementary guest, coating Wayne's post-Katrina tale "Tie My Hands" in warm buttery soul. Carter," and with Babyface laying the stylish swagger all over "Comfortable," Wayne gets the opportunity to convincingly vibe in the land of true class. Giant meets giant when Jay-Z stops by for the velvet-smooth hangout session "Mr. Carter," when the football reference "And you ain't Vince Young/So don't clash with the Titan" dances on a David Axelrod sample and an unexpected jazzy production from Swizz Beatz.
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It wouldn't be the electro-bumpin' "Lollipop," an infectious track that contains the wonderfully Wayne line "I told her to back it up/Like burp, burp." You certainly wouldn't want to lose key cut "Phone Home," where the maverick adopts an alien voice and drops "I could get your brains for a bargain/Like I bought it from Target." Another Weezy special from way outside the hip-hop universe comes in the striking "Dr. 5 - the "classic" argument could be considered, but figuring out what to sacrifice from this high-grade jumble is difficult.
#The carter 3 lil wayne series
4 - just one of his mixtape series that made it to a Pt. Had he included another easy-access single like "Rider" from The Drought Is Over, Pt. Tha Carter III is instead a surprisingly casual album that takes numerous listens to sort out, and only part of a puzzle that is scattered across mixtapes, guest shots, and Internet leaks. His "best rapper alive" quote is discussed to death, but if that claim includes creating perfectly crafted full-lengths in a 2Pac style, the evidence won't be found here.
#The carter 3 lil wayne plus
There's his complete annihilation of the mixtape game, the ridiculous amount of guest shots he granted since Tha Carter II made him a hip-hop superstar, that photograph of him kissing his mentor, Birdman, rumors of addiction to the sizzurp, plus the gargantuan ego and aggravating aloofness ( Wayne will ignore all incoming beefs and infuriate challengers even further by offering the lethal "I don't listen to your records"). How Tha Carter III came to be "the most anticipated rap album of 2008" is a story that involves the usual delays and promises of a masterpiece, plus a whole lot of bullet points that could only exist in the absurd world of Lil Wayne.
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