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| Where'd this guy go? |
I'm big on Twitter...not in the sense that I'm important or anything on Twitter, but in the sense that I love Twitter. The constant stream of consciousness on Twitter keeps me coming back daily for more. Random "slander," funny PhotoShops of people, and the same tired debates keep me fairly interested in that social network. So one day while on Twitter, I noticed someone talking about Common as a rapper...asking how does his catalog measure up to others of his era, and whether he's actually been a dope rapper. For me, it was an easy question;
The Dreamer, The Believer is critically acclaimed and was the best Common work since
BE. As far as his credentials, this is the guy who did "Come Close", "6th Sense," and "The Light," so that was just a stupid question. However, since I am working on a post comparing the discographies of Jay-Z, Ghostface Killah, and Nas, I figured that I might as well dive into Common's rap record and see if he actually does have enough albums to be mentioned in the same breath as rap's greats.
Common's debut album,
Can I Borrow a Dollar?, is something I first heard with a different set of beats. Maybe if I had heard the original first, I would have a higher opinion of it, but as it is, I think that the beats are a little dated. If your introduction to Common was
BE, then you will be pretty surprised by this album; it has a much grittier sound, with a lot more youthful swagger than one might expect. His rhymes are ridiculous (in a good way), tripping over themselves and stumbling through the tracks...it really puts me in the mind of a younger Jay-Z to be honest. When you think about it like that, that Jay line "truthfully I wanna rhyme like Common Sense" makes a LOT more sense. Their original styles are pretty similar, even if the content is different. As you can tell from the name of the album (and the cover art), this work really represents the hood. There are stories about girls, about common occurrences in the hood, and just general shit talking, rather than materialistic raps about Benzes, mafia ties, and ice. Overall, this is a solid debut, but it's no
Illmatic or
Reasonable Doubt. I think the production hurts it a bit, so overall, it's no classic.
Rating: 3.5/5
Standout tracks: "A Penny for My Thoughts," "Blows to the Temple," "Soul By The Pound"
Resurrection starts off with an entirely different sound from
Can I Borrow a Dollar?, and this is a very good thing. The title track is quite strong, and we really get to hear Common's lyrical dexterity over beats worthy of his bars. The album is also notable in that it represents the beginning of the Common/Ice Cube beef, with "I Used to Love H.E.R." being seen as a salvo fired at Ice Cube and his camp. As we remember later, Common was no bitch, so when Cube fired back, we got to see Common's response later. Even taking away that element from the track, that is the best Common record we had heard at that point. It was this track (and this album as a whole) that really pushed Common into the critical forefront, and gave him the reputation he has to this day. For me, it was really easy to see once again how Jay-Z and Common were so similar as rappers; "Communism" is basically "22 Two's", with Common using words starting with "com" instead of the words "to, two, too" to get his point across. We still get social commentary, but it's not as slick as on
Can I Borrow a Dollar?; instead of being a smart-ass about the realities of the hood, Common is a more direct on tracks like "Chapter 13 (Rich Man vs. Poor Man)". This album also has the first of the "Pop's Rap" endings that became a mark of Common's albums, which was pretty interesting. Overall, I think it's slightly better than his debut, but it has a couple of interludes that disrupt momentum. Additionally, despite a couple of strong efforts, it isn't as consistent as I would like.
Rating: 3.5/5
Standouts: "I Used to Love H.E.R.," "Communism," "Resurrection"
Released in September 1997,
One Day It'll All Make Sense was the beginning of Common's change into the Common that we know. He began working with the Soulquarians and other "conscious" artists, and the edge from his debut was all but gone. His voice was different as well; gone were the random cracks and squeaks that filled his debut and parts of
Resurrection. This was a new artist, and the album plays as such. From the opening track, "Introspective," we know that we are journeying into the mind of a new man; indeed, Common was to become a father, and this album helped represent his growth into a mature adult. This coincides with the features...instead of just Ynot, other hip-hop heavyweights provide assistance to Common. It's easy to forget that Cee-Lo was actually a good rapper at one point, but he drops a killer verse on "G.O.D. (Gaining One's Definition)", and Lauryn Hill provides an EXCELLENT chorus on "Retrospective for Life." Erykah Badu and Black Thought also make appearances on the album, giving it that "backpacker" sound. In case you thought that Common lost his lyrical ferocity though, he drops "Hungry," a short and poignant track filled with gems like "flashbacks of past raps make me so glad I made it" and "came in this rap life nude, now I'm fully clothed in flows." Canibus adds to this sense of boom-bap with his appearance on "Making a Name for Ourselves." This is Common's first classic in my mind...it was focused, full of great tracks, and really represented the beginning of a new movement. It set the groundwork for excellent works released by Mos Def, Erykah Badu, and indeed, Common himself.
Rating: 4.5/5
Standouts: "Retrospective for Life," "Hungry," "1'2 Many..."...really, this entire album is great. I REALLY recommend "Retrospective for Life" though.
Personally,
Like Water for Chocolate is Common's best work. It came during his time working with the Soulquarians, was laced with beats by the late, great J Dilla, and was very consistent overall. The cover art was something unique; in a time where we were typically getting rappers posing with cars or jewelry or women, Common was busy using a stark image from America's past. If you remember other albums from 2000,
Country Grammar comes to mind, as well as
The Dynasty: Roc La Familia, in addition to
Stankonia and
Supreme Clientele. While the Soulquarian movement was in full swing (so we got a Reflection Eternal album, Common really grabbed the standard for "conscious" rap in 2000 with this work. In terms of content, Common is at his Afrocentric finest, with lines like "most sell out, like a dread with a white girl," and a dedication to Assata Shakur, a former Black Panther currently residing in Cuba. From the tribute to Fela Kuti in the intro track "Time Travelin," to the smooth love song "The Light," to the DJ Premier-produced "The 6th Sense," Common was at the top of his game here. J Dilla and Common made a very formidable pair, and really, there isn't one bad track on this album. The rhymes aren't anywhere near as slippery as on
Resurrection or
Can I Borrow a Dollar?, but in terms of composition, focus, and production, this album was far superior. Twelve years later, this album retains its classic status, being a work that is timeless.
Rating: 5/5
Standouts: "A Song for Assata," "The 6th Sense," "A Film Called (Pimp)" Again, this entire album is great, you can't really go wrong.
Most artists have that point in their career where they go off the beaten path and get critiqued heavily for it (think
808s and Heartbreaks or
Kingdom Come). Depending on the strength of the artist's career, this can be devastating or be something that they move on from. For Common, this moment was
Electric Circus. Personally, I like the album; the sound is obviously very different from his previous efforts, but Common has been in a state of constant change, so that isn't a big deal to me. The production is largely handled by ?uestlove and J Dilla, both familiar names for anyone who had been following the Soulquarian movement. Overall, the problem for me was that not only was the album different in sound than his other albums, but even within the album there wasn't a uniform sound. While has worked for some others, on this work, it comes across as cluttered. There are great moments on here, but there are also those ones you instantly skip, such as "Electric Wire Hustler Flower." Really, you can see influences of this album on Janelle Monae's
The Archandroid, and the overall bend is similar to
The Love Below, and both of those albums are great. For this album, though, it seems that the eclecticism is dialed up to 11 at some points, and that's what brings the album down. While not a bad album, this stopped the momentum that Common had been building, and was probably his worst work overall. However, let me state that the highs on this album are EXCELLENT. "Between Me, You, and Liberation," in particular is an all-time great hip-hop song. If you don't listen to this album in its entirety, at least listen to
this track.
Rating: 3/5
Standouts: "Between Me, You, and Liberation," "Come Close," "Aquarius"
Following Geffen's acquisition of MCA, Common went 3 years without releasing an album. Signing with Kanye West, who had catapulted into stardom through his debut
The College Dropout, Common released
BE, an album considered by some to be Common's greatest work. I'll listen to that argument without immediately dismissing it, as the combination of Common and Kanye West produced yet another classic for Common. Touching on familiar subject matter such as inner city violence, love, and Afrocentricism (
which resulted in a riff with some UK artists),
BE is a return to the soulful, hip-hop sound that Common had before
Electric Circus. While some (including myself) think the beats are a touch too commercial, the results were Common being exposed to a larger crowd and making him relevant to the present state of hip-hop, both of which are good for hip-hop. In terms of punchlines and wittiness, this album isn't up to the standards of
Resurrection, but rather than adding filler songs, Common releases a lot of content in a short (it's only 43min long), incredibly focused work. The worst track on the album (in my opinion "Faithful") is still better than the vast majority of hip-hop released in 2005, and the best track (in my opinion "The Corner") has The Last Poets on it...what other popular rapper could you see having The Last Poets on his/her album? As an entire work, the fact that most of this is produced with that signature Kanye sound circa 2005 makes
BE an easier listen than Common's other classics. Overall, I think it's his 2nd best work.
Rating: 4.5/5
Standouts: "The Corner," "Testify," "Real People"
After
BE, it was hard to imagine what album would come next from Common. Still working closely with Kanye West, the sky seemed to be the limit for his next project, and when the first single, "The People" came out, excitement for the album grew. In the end, it came off as
BE Pt. 2 than as its own project, and some of the more pop-sounding records had some cringe-inducing bars ("driving herself crazy like that astronaut lady" is a double entendre, but...man, what an "ugh" moment). I don't really approve of will.i.am touching any hip-hop record at this point, and the "stadium status" sounds of Kanye West's
Graduation (in my opinion, his worst work) permeate the album. As with any Common album, there are some very strong moments; "Southside," "The People," and "The Game" provide plenty of that boom bap sound, and "Black Maybe" gives us an introspective look into what being Black is. Overall,
Finding Forever is a solid release, but it amplifies the "too commercial" complaint that some fans had of
BE by 10. I love Lily Allen (especially around that time), but her on a Common record just seemed forced, and there was a little too much love talk and not enough social commentary. Again, not a bad album, but not up to the standard he set with
BE.
Rating: 3.5/5
Standouts: "Black Maybe," "Southside," "The People"
Usually, when an artist goes too far from what made him/her successful, and they receive backlash, they refrain from doing that again. However, every so often, there is an artist who ignores prior negativity and experiments again. Common is that artist. Despite negative ratings of
Electric Circus, Common went back into that territory with
Universal Mind Control. I think the track "Make My Day" featuring Cee-Lo pretty much tells you everything you need to know about the change from the
One Day It'll All Make Sense days to the UMC days...Cee-Lo dropped a pretty killer verse on his feature verse for "G.O.D." but is singing the hook to an upbeat track on "Make My Day." Evolution is good; one of the complaints about Eminem is a lack of change in his subject matter. People complain about Jay-Z still dropping materialistic raps rather than ones suiting someone of his age, like a Nas. However, the answer to that probably isn't spitting over electronic Neptunes production. Overall, I've had no need to keep this album in my library. I can understand that it's not a bad album, but it doesn't speak to me at all. Definitely not a necessary part of the Common discography.
Rating: 2/5
Standout: "Gladiator"
Once again, after receiving backlash from a "different" style of album, Common went back to his roots and worked primarily with one producer, in this case Kanye West's mentor (and former Common collaborator) No I.D.
The Dreamer/The Believer is as different from
Universal Mind Control as
BE was from
Electric Circus, which is good for those of us who didn't like UMC. Overall, the bars aren't the best that Common has ever spit, but the production more than makes up for it. It's weird hearing the artist responsible for "The Light" or "Come Close" getting at Drake, but it really felt necessary for someone on the team to get at him after all of the sideways talking. Even better, he actually drops "Lovin' I Lost" two tracks later, showing he has no problem with the love songs, but rather the way Drake does them. The overall sound is a little glossier than
BE, but less so than
Finding Forever, so there's a nice balance there. The track with Nas, "Ghetto Dreams," is a collaboration that hip-hop heads had been waiting on since Nas started doing joints with Jay-Z and Kanye. We've got John Legend getting his croon on, and Pops returns for another dope outro. On
BE, it was The Last Poets feature that made heads turn on; on this, Common has Maya "And Still I Rise" Angelou on the opening track. Wow. There are no classic tracks like "The 6th Sense" on here, but all of the tracks are solid. It's a little...too happy for me, but really, even after the Serena break-up, Common looked to be at a pretty nice spot in life. He's on a team that supports him, working as both an actor and a rapper, participating in celebrity basketball games, just overall having a good time, so I guess expecting some depressing stuff isn't fair to dude. This isn't a classic, but it's another solid contribution to Common's discography.
Rating: 4/5
Standouts: "Ghetto Dreams," "The Dreamer," "The Believer"
So in a 20-year period, Common has released 9 albums. Out of these, I'd argue that 3 (
One Day...,
BE, and
Like Water...) are classics, and 3 others (
Finding Forever,
Resurrection, and
The Dreamer...) are very good. There's really only one dud (
UMC), and the last two are still above-average works. In terms of classic songs, Common has plenty of them, especially considering he's only dropped 9 albums. Personally, I think his discography is both more prolific and consistent than Eminem's, and some argue that Eminem is the G.O.A.T. While he hasn't released enough albums for me to consider him for my later post comparing Jay/Nas/GFK, it's difficult to argue with someone who has arguably dropped 3 classics in addition to other high-quality albums (a reason why I think Jay is the G.O.A.T., but that's another post). To those who say that Common's rhymes aren't as good as they once were, I wholeheartedly agree. The flow he uses now is much different from what he came in the game with, and even the imagery is different. However, I believe that what he lost as a rapper, he gained as an artist. His works got more focused and consistent, and outside of
Universal Mind Control, he really never dropped an album with more bad songs than great songs. Compared to Mos Def and Talib Kweli (two artists he's commonly compared to...*rimshot*) his discography is spectacular, even though I think
Black on Both Sides is as good as any work that Common has released. He served as an inspiration for Kanye West, and 20 years after coming into the game, retains some level of relevance...an example for these new rappers to follow. Once that
Nas.Com drops, I think we're going to be discussing where we place Common in the hip-hop pantheon - his albums are really that good.
