Your Favorite White Boy

They say confession is good for the soul. Today we offer another installment of The Confessional, an ongoing feature on Your Favorite White Boy, where your man B-Double will be confessing certain things that he would not dare bring up in the company of his hip-hop brethren.

Oftentimes when you run a blog or website that is based on opinion or commentary rather than regurgitating videos, music and articles from other sites, you run the risk of going against conventional wisdom. In some cases, you also run the risk of appearing out-of sync with the rest of your readership. This is one of those times. My issue: I’m just not feeling the artist with all the buzz right now, Drake.

Being on top of things, I know that Drake is going to be huge. The man can sing as well as he can rap – and he doesn’t need autotune for either. He’s down with Weezy and his Young Money crew, so that will gurantee exposure and proper promotion. And from all my activity on Twitter and peeping various blogs, I know that when So Far Gone dropped last week it was the joint to cop.

I had my doubts early. While I admired his creativity for flipping “Say You Will” from Kanye, some of the other tracks that had leaked out had me as excited as a hooker waiting for her STD results. But I figured that 1,000 bloggers can’t be wrong, so I follwed the masses and downloaded his latest just like everyone else.

Now, an important footnote: I don’t really like R&B. I respect it and sure, there are some jams I have keyed up in the iPod, but as a general rule I don’t mess with it. In fact, I don’t have one R&B LP in my collection. I’m strictly a hip-hop head. So, my evaluation of Drake needs to be handicapped to some extent because I’m not going to like 1/2 his album right from the jump. But, I still figured I’d give him a shot.

After listening to So Far Gone in its entirety, I can confirm that he will be big. This is the perfect time for a crooning/rapping Wayne affiliate to drop. He will sell millions of records – just not to me.

This is one of those times where I can respect the talent but not enjoy it. I think its dope that Drizzy can switch lanes and sing his own hook with assistance. And he writes well enough to apparently ghostwrite for Weezy. But I though So Far Gone was average at best. I’m not an R&B fan, as I’ve said. And his lyrical content and flow isn’t on point enough to make up the difference.

Now, I know everyone is jumping on this man’s johnson and I’m alright with that. And the early reviews tell me that I’m in the minority. And I’m Ok with that too. This isn’t a popularity contest. It is important to to the integrity of YFWB that I express my opinion, regardless of how (un)popular it is at the time.

Heads told me that I would warm up to 808s eventually as well. They said it would just take a few spins to absorb into my consciousness and then I’d feel it. Well guess what? 2-3 months later (and 2-3 spins) later and its still in iPod purgatory. So Far Gone will suffer the same fate.

I feel bad because dude is from my city Toronto. However, I’ve never felt compelled to support someone because we’re from the same region. If I dig you I dig you – I don’t care where your from.

And I don’t dig Drake.

Tags: Drake, Lil Wayne, So Far Gone Mixtape