MS. G.O.A.T.: GREATEST OF ALL TIME
Lil' Kim
Dec. 30, 2007
A year and a half ago Lil' Kim was released from prison, having served a federal sentence for perjury. The charge stemmed from testimony she gave about a shoot-out in 2001 outside the New York radio station Hot 97. Since then she has been relatively quiet, but she broke her musical silence this month with a mixtape, Ms. G.O.A.T.: Greatest of All Time, compiled by Whoo Kid and Mister Cee.
Record companies have complicated feelings about mixtapes, which promote top rappers while also violating copyright law. (Since no royalties are paid, they can't legally be sold or even given away.) But these days that's not Lil' Kim's problem. She recently told MTV that she was leaving her longtime home, Atlantic Records. "They're letting me fly," she said.
To celebrate, she has made a fitfully entertaining mixtape. Some of her rhymes are alarmingly clumsy. (For example: "Some wanna play Queen Bee like she dumb/I burn rappers like tanning under the sun.") But it's a relief to hear her sounding as brash as ever, even after a few difficult years.
There remains something pleasingly paradoxical about her approach. The more she brags about her sexual appeal, the more she de-emphasizes it, underscoring the notion that she would rather be powerful than desirable. "Men see the video/And go lick the TV, slow," she rhymes, shifting her (and our) focus from the image on screen to the salivators in front of it.
Elsewhere she borrows beats from Lauryn Hill and the Lady of Rage; remakes a famous Notorious B.I.G. skit; adds her voice to hits by Britney Spears (Gimme More) and Gucci Mane (Freaky Gurl); and mercilessly taunts the competition, especially in the sing-song Track 10. You won't be reading its title here. Suffice it to say that prison hasn't given her any extra sympathy for her detractors.
THE FIGHT OF MY LIFE
Kirk Franklin
Dec. 13, 2007
A decade ago, when the gospel star Kirk Franklin - joined by the God's Property choir and Salt, from Salt 'N' Pepa - had a crossover hit with Stomp, it seemed that updated gospel music might be reaching an accommodation with mainstream hip-hop and R&B. And why not? Since many (probably most) rappers and R&B stars are Christians, and since the genres share so much musical history, it seems inevitable in retrospect that a brash young man of God would storm the pop charts.
But the presence of Stomp on secular radio wasn't really a sign of things to come. Gospel remains separate from the pop mainstream, and these days Franklin is definitely a gospel star, not a pop star. But he loves to present himself as a hip-hop-generation maverick who's not afraid to shock the old folks in service of reaching the young ones. A few years ago he sat down with Oprah Winfrey to explain how he overcame his addiction to pornography. And during a recent interview he said, "There's nothing weak about me, just 'cause I'm a Jesus cat."
Franklin's new album is The Fight of My Life, and it works, when it works, because of his manic energy. The first single, Declaration (This Is It!), uses an old Kenny Loggins song as the basis for a thumping track that's halfway between hip-hop and go-go; the video, echoing the album cover, stars Franklin as a boxer. (That's one way to sneak a bare chest into a gospel video.) He sings a little and raps a little, but he really excels at interjection, narration and peroration.
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