![]() Descriptions of Food & Liquor were littered with phrases like “throwback to hip-hop’s glory days” and The Cool proves that it wasn’t a fluke. In fact, he should be commended for rapping about far more than just himself (although he does that too on “The Coolest”, a majestic anthem in which the rapper declares, “I love the lord / But sometimes it’s like that I love me more!”). And if Fiasco’s underlying moral message occasionally veers in anti-violence cliché territory, it’s forgivable. A devout Muslim, Fiasco’s lyrics have run the gamut from skateboarding narratives to Japanese manga references, and get this: he was turned off by the vulgar nature of Public Enemy and N.W.A. Of course, Lupe Fiasco has never been mistaken for a typical rapper. “Be like Dick Shoot a gun,” shouts the mock poster on the wall, typifying the sort of not-so-thinly veiled social message that Fiasco pursues on his ambitious sophomore effort, set in blissful contrast with the brilliantly flashy, pop production. For those old-fashioned folks still buying CDs (myself included), Lupe Fiasco’s debut, Food & Liquor, offered more in the way of liner notes than the typical modern hip-hop record: instead of opting for a glamorous photo booklet, Fiasco used it as an outlet for social commentary, a flipbook of sorts documenting a boy’s descent into gang violence in a trigger-happy society.
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