Consumer Guide Album

Lil Wayne: The Drought Is Over 2: The Carter 3 Sessions [mixtape4u.com, 2007]
Title and label approximate. I prefer the other version of this ad hoc collection in my possession even though it slices the ends off tracks--it's louder, with hotter unmatched songs. But I'm reviewing this because it's obtainable online even with mixtape4u.com now drawing a blank. Look above Wayne's name on the cover image for "The Empire," words that repeat in annoying voiceover ad infinitum; note also the Arabic three as opposed to the Roman numeral of the official release, which shares only a more casual "La La La" with this supposed leak. Skip it and you never hear the actually believable love plaint "What He Does," the in-their-face Beatles rip "Help," the celestially drugged-out "I Feel Like Dying," or, for instance, "I Know the Future": "Like a circle of knives/I got the sharpest flow around." Granted, maybe it's the jaggedest flow around, or the underground stream that slices through rock to move mountains. But superlatives apply. Snicker-snack, snicker-snack, he can't contain himself, the rare modern pop artist who says he's in it for money but always gives up the love rather than vice versa. A-