These days, I buy albums on CD or at digital stores like iTunes in roughly equal measure, and usually there's not much logic to what I buy where, unless one version or the other has bonus tracks or I really want the CD to bump in the car. But with Fabolous's new album, Loso's Way, I made a point to grab it on Amazon MP3 expressly to avoid ending up with a physical copy with the bonus DVD 'movie.' I just don't think I'm ready to sit through Fab's own Streets Is Watching. Hell, I could barely get through Jay's. Plus that faux-trailer video for "My Time" was pretty cringe-inducing if that's an indication of what it's like.

I'm definitely not going to say my recent commenter's concerns about Loso's Way aren't warranted; "a normally dead-eyed rapper trying and failng to be more dynamic than usual" sums it up pretty well, actually. The extra effort to add emphasis and inflection to his delivery isn't really necessary anyway, since it just makes his wit seem less dry and nonchalant, which is a big part of his appeal for me. I am at least relieved that he doesn't try to get as animated as Lil Wayne to keep up with him on "Salute" in that super-embarrassing way Pharrell did on "Yes."

Fennessey's recent Voice piece gets at the central paradox of Fabolous pretty well, although it maybe overstates that it's even worth wondering who he is or pretending to be disappointed every time he fails to make an album that's more hardcore rap than R&B crossover. Everyone jokes about Fab having a singer on every other track, but "Feel Like I'm Back" is a harsh reminder that he's generally best not left to his own devices for hooks (or, for that matter, spoken intros, although I always LOL @ "if you happen to bump into the streets, can you please tell 'em I'm back?"). Like any Fab album, it's only as good as its songs, and this one generally has a good batting average, especially as far as modern-sounding synth squiggle beats like DJ Khalil's on "Imma Do It" and Ryan Leslie's on "Everything, Everyday, Everywhere." And there's one absolute banger, "Pachanga," and the perfunctory 'personal' song "Stay" actually kinda works for me. So I'll just say that it's definitely better than From Nothin' To Somethin' and leave alone whether that means anything at all.
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He-he, thanks for the shout, Al! I've still yet to hear Loso's Way in its entirety, although the intro is epic. And you have to love a tongue-twister like, "They holla like a toddler/
Come holla at your gualla, dont holla at sovallas/You'll end up down under tryna holla at Koalas."

Speaking of From Nothin' to Somethin', why was "Make Me Better" so popular in '07? That song's ommipresence still baffles me, two years after the fact. It's not awful, but it is probably the blandest, most pedestrian Timbo beat of all-time.
 
Yeah, I don't like "Make Me Better" at all, either. I think it was just the perfect storm of Ne-Yo and Timbaland in the middle of that two-year stretch where one or the other was responsible for every other #1 hit at the time.
 
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