Image via Complex Original
Here we go again: another national holiday, another new Lil Wayne mixtape for me to cover on my alleged day off, because someone has to. Earlier this year, it was the Tidal-exclusive Free Weezy Album on Independence Day. Fitting, considering Wayne's fleeing Cash Money like a refugee finally free of an oppressive dictator. Unfortunately, save a bright spot here and there, the sum of the project's parts amounted to one damp ass firework, and I said as much and spent the next week ignoring Weezy stans in my mentions. It's like you guys think I have something out for him—I'm a Wayne fan, albeit one who finds Carter III overrated but also still has high hopes for Carter V.
So, here we are, four months later. It's 8 p.m., the tape just dropped, I'm full of turkey in a house filled with my mom's side of the family and perhaps a little bent off some unspecified cocktails my cousin has been pouring up. I loved the first No Ceilings—"Wasted" has basically never left my recently played, "Single" is one of the best Wayne songs of all time, etc. Wayne's been very hit or miss these days. Is he about to sully another classic mixtape with a trash sequel? To reiterate, this is not a review per se. I'm literally writing my thoughts as I listen through once. I just know my family is going to interrupt me all throughout this long ass tape, but here we go....
The Listening
"Fresh" — Well, this is off to a horrible start.
"Back 2 Back" — No. No, no, no, no, no, no.
"My Name Is" — Random.
"Where Ya At" — "I'm moving slow, Lisa Turtle, Lark Voorhies." The kind of line that's so dumb I can't help but laugh. A Wayne specialty. (This is pretty bad, though.)
"Cross Me" — Do I detect a sample of "A Week Ago?" Either way, leave it up to Wayne to absolutely brick a Future feature. Sigh.
"I'm Nice" — The first real disappointment of the tape. Theoretically, Wayne should body beats like this Bryson Tiller joint, but this is just as useless as the first five songs.
Cue the first INTERRUPTION of the listening. My cousin's boyfriend is trying to debate me about a Justin Charity Hot Take, as if I have any control over that savage contrarian and his opinion.
"Duck" — First song I'm not itching to immediately drag to Recycle Bin, so there's that. Shanell might be the worst singer alive though.
"Poppin" — Not bad but a sorry sign that Curren$y does better on a beat like this.
INTERRUPTION: "Where do I buy this magazine so I can read your stuff?" asks aunt. "Well, (for the 10th time), you can go to complex dot com for whatever fee your chosen wi-fi service appoints you."
Cousin interjects: "Is Lil Wayne gonna call you if you give his tape a bad review?"
"Jumpman" — OK, now this is what I'm fucking talking about. I would've liked if he played around with his own interpolation of "Chicken fingers, fries," but at this point in the tape, I'm not greedy.
"Destroyed" — Ay bruh, YMCMB is (was?) full of a lot of cartoon characters, but I always kind of liked Euro. He raps less like he's flowing and more like he's recounting a story to his homie and someone happened to press record, but he's infinitely less struggle than most of Wayne's weed carriers, and he has an energy to match Wayne's whole Chug-a-Monster-rip-an-ollie wave. This song is dope.
"Finessin" — Wayne was made for these types of beats.
"Millyrokk" — Fam, the one and only time I've ever heard a Lucci Lou verse let alone heard of Lucci Lou was on the original No Ceilings' "I'm Good," where he follows a standout Wayne verse with the line, "Still no job, but I ain't hurtin." Then five years later, he makes his grand return and guess what? "Still no job." I'm dead.
"Live From the Gutter" — Wayne says, "I ain't talking no more Cash Money shit."
INTERRUPTION. I had to pause and reflect on how fire the original No Ceilings title track is, with an especially fire Birdman verse ("High life, give a fuck about your stripes, homie"). Normally I don't care, but sometimes this Wayne and Baby schism is sad as fuck, bruh. Anyway, Wayne bodied this.
"Big Wings" — I realized before pressing play what this would obviously be, but still, it sounds like a combo deal at Popeyes. Anyway, if we're being honest, short of saying "jibber jabber," he lowkey attacked this harder than Champagne and Hendrix did.
"Too Young" — I'm screaming at him rapping over "White Iverson" but titling it the other Post Malone song. (Also, "bakery," "fakery," "snakery" ??)
"Lil Bitch" — Just as boring as the original.
"Get Ya Gat" — I only needed one Lucci Lou on this tape, thanks.
"No Reason" — Wow, King Los going in. Between this and his verses on MMM, he's had some tight bars recently.
"Plastic Bag" — Nope, nope, nah, no thanks.
"Hotline Bling" — This actually isn't terrible! And the jail perspective is kind of dope! Had this pegged to be as awful and awfully unnecessary as "Back 2 Back."
INTERRUPTION "No, I've never met Drake. Gosh what do you guys think, I'm just hanging out with rappers and actors all day well—actually it's not that glamorous, OK? I did troll him over the phone once, though."
"Crystal Ball" — "Got Steph walking around the house in just a thong and I'm in my drawers." As in, the Steph who's featured on this song? Never mind.
"Diamonds Dancing" — Yet another hard pass in the Take Every Poppin Drake Song column.
"No Days Off" — This song varies between stages of being actually OK and irritating.
"The Hills" — This is awful, straight up, no quips.
The Verdict
Well, this tape isn't horrific. The back half from "Jumpman" onward has more enjoyable moments than not. I cannot seriously picture myself ever listening to these songs again, though. In between making me take my headphones off every six minutes to answer a question, my family fucking devoured what was left of the turkey, and all I got for my lack of seconds thirds was an average ass Wayne tape. Gone are the days when this guy used to take a song that had its own merit and demand that you play his freestyle instead because it was just so fire.
Mediocrity of the Free Weezy Album aside, I'm going to need Wayne to step away from mixtapes and just focus on original music, because there's still a spark of genius in that department. Guest verses like "M'$," "Deep," and "Smuckers" confirm as much. I still love "Believe Me," "Krazy," and "Dusse" from the mythical Carter V. But these days, the argument for Lil Wayne's continued presence in contemporary hip-hop never feels more insubstantial than when he's churning out the equivalent of struggle rapper freestyles and collecting them into space-wasting tapes. I don't want to keep hating on dude, but he keeps pushing me.