Return of the King?

Thanks to Tim Douglas, my Ecuadorian bubble was recently burst as I learned about rapper T.I.´s newest release ¨The Paper Trail.¨

Without a CD player or bit torrent, it was a little more difficult than usual to find a copy of this album to listen to. Having been a TI fan since his release of ¨King¨ in 2006, I was pretty excited about his newest release. I rediscovered his 2007 release ¨TI vs TIP¨ over the summer and found there were actually a few tracks that were really great. With this, I was excited for an album full of ¨Watch What you Say¨s and ¨What you Know.¨

Unfortunately, I found an album that seems like it was produced by monkeys trying to reproduce the hits of the past year on BET. I found an album with tracks full of imitation of styles that didn´t sound like the TI I know and love. Where is that heavy synth and dirty south beat that was so typical of his first two albums? Where is the almost laughably bad-ass lyrics (¨I´m da dope man, nigga¨) from TI vs TIP.

This album was an all right pop-rap album, and I´m sure it will sell millions. But for TI, this was a disappointment to me. The most popular track, so far, ¨Whatever you Like,¨ is a cute, R&B sounding tune in which TI sings about how he will ¨blow a few stacks¨ on that special girl. This song sounds like a radio hit from Fabulous or some similar R&B guy. Come on, dude.

The one track worth listening to is, as usual, the Just Blaze produced ¨Live your Life.¨ Other than that, you can save your time and just listen to ¨King.¨