“The Breeze” features Wiz Khalifa & UCB’s Tre. Then he announces that he’s got to go get his chowder on, and the track’s over. He’s even waiting for “Pitchfork to say Wale’s the way to go.” Wale, this might not be Pitchfork, but we’re behind you. There’s another brilliant NBA line: “Shoulda been an all-star, I’m Crawford for Interscope”. Best Kept Secret produces a slick, electric guitar-heavy track for Wale to rap over, even remixing that “No soup for you” line for the bridge.

“The Soup” opens with that ultimate catchphrase of a character, The Soup Nazi. Horn stabs and live drumming courtesy of producer Mark Henry spice up “The MC”, with Wale turning in more great lines (his rhymes are “tighter than some bike shorts”). The rest of the song seems to sample that famous 90’s Bulls starting lineup song, with Wale spitting about how he’s “hungry like a plastic hippopotamus.” The flow is amazing, covering everything from music label politics to modern medicine. The track kicks up, still a little melancholy, until Seinfeld finally comes in, talking about how Wale needs to go to Vienna to see the top psychiatrists. What do you start with, then? A slow piano line and a loose, monotonous set of couplets about making that “proverbial lemonade” when you get dealt lemons. While all of this sounds characteristic of Attention Deficit, it should come as no surprise that Wale’s return to blog-released music from his quest into the record stores should signal a complete return to the purest form of that sound. Perhaps I’m not the best person to explain why, but the blog culture (from indie rock to hip-hop purists) love Wale’s mixtapes. In a sense, it was the ultimate Blog-hop representation: a willingness to commit to an aesthetic that goes beyond the mainstream, a unique voice, a willingness to joke around, and a love of referencing other pop culture. Wale investigated the impact of racial slurs as well as he made sly references to sitcom material. So, what’s a guy to do when he needs a little attention? Release a second mixtape based around Seinfeld (after 2008’s A Mixtape About Nothing), of course.Īrguably his best work, Mixtape About Nothing was as hard-hitting in the drama department as it was in the humor.

His greatly anticipated, and also just plain great, Attention Deficitcame and went, with the hyperspeed Internet media waiting to find the next Next Big Thing. Well, the whole hubbub about Wale seems to have, at least momentarily, come and gone.

Wale album about nothing zippy