In many ways it feels as if he's paying tribute (or perhaps challenging) resident speed limit destroyer (and fellow Chi-Town denizen) Twista. Fiasco conforms his flow to the breakneck roll, delivering lickety-split lyrics that require astute ears to snag what he's saying. The orchestral nuances continue to ripple through "Go Go Gadget Flow," as violins go head-to-head with rapid fire drum machine beats in a rhythmic melee. This leads into a symphonic surge on "Free Chilly", a track that is consumed with swooning vocals that owe more to darkly lit Quiet Storm theatrics than hip-hop. Things start off with "Baba Says Cool For Thought" wherein Iesha Jaco delivers a pointed social commentary about what is (and isn't) cool. While the art on that album presented twisted ghetto verite (kids assembling guns in elementary school, for example), here the imagery is ripped out of some alternate universe Edgar Allan Poe fever dream. Also, don't expect to see Kanye's name listed any where amongst the production credits for the album's 19 tracks.Īdditionally, in terms of album art, the vibe is much eerier than on Fiasco's Food & Liquor debut. For starters the prominent name of Jay-Z is absent from the Executive Producers credits (Chill, Fiasco, and Darrale Jones are still on board in this capacity). “Dumb It Down” is a portfolio of exploratory rhyme styles: “I'm not a listener or a seer so my windshield smear / Here you steer, I really shouldn't be behind this / Clearly cause my blindness / The windshield is min-strel / The whole grill is roadkill / So trill and so sincere / Yeah, I'm both them there.” While songs like “Put You On Game” become too grandiloquent for their own good, there are dozens of verses on The Cool that are as complex and challenging as anything a Grammy-nominated rapper has ventured.For his second go-around Chicago based MC Lupe Fiasco switches a few things up, but leaves a few others familiar. As his music grows beyond the simple nostalgia of his 2006 hit “Kick, Push,” Lupe weaves what are easily mainstream rap’s most ambitious verses. However, some of the best moments on The Cool hearken back to the nimble mischief of A Tribe Called Quest “Paris, Tokyo” is Lupe’s holler-back to Tribe’s classic “Award Tour,” while “Gold Watch,” with its tricky beat and trickier rhymes, might be the album’s best song.
“The Coolest,” “Little Weapon,” “Hello Goodbye,” and “The Die” are chock full of sound and syllable, buoyed by the same enormous, inflatable synths as Kanye’s Graduation. Developing in tandem with his Chi-Town mentor Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco’s sophomore effort is a far grander than his debut.
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