1.29.2004
On the Real
A reader pointed out that I never finished the Kanye thought down below. I will soon. The short version: College Dropout is a beautiful mess of self-conflict up and down (not exactly virgin soil in hip-hop-land) and Kanye, fudging between Benz and backpack, is what he is--a hot producer with a bumpy flow. I've listened to Kanye's 'All Falls Down' ('Self Conscious' to all the bootleg heads) probably fifty times and the lyrics here (like much of the rest of the album) still astound me:
“I say Fuck the Police, that’s how I treat ‘em/We buy our way out of jail but we can’t buy freedom/We buy a lot of clothes but don’t really need ‘em/Things we buy to cover up what’s inside/Cause they made us hate ourselves and love they wealth/That’s why shorty hollerin’ ‘Where the ballers at?/Drug dealer buy Jordans/Crackhead buy crack/And the white man get paid off all of that
But I ain’t even gonna act holier than thou/Cause fuck it, I went to Jacob’s with twenty-five thou/Before I had a house and I’d do it again/Cause I want to be on 106 and Park pushing a Benz/I want to act ballerific like it’s all terrific/I got a couple past-due bills, I won’t get specific/I got a problem with spending before I get it/We all self-conscious, I’m just the first to admit it.”
“I say Fuck the Police, that’s how I treat ‘em/We buy our way out of jail but we can’t buy freedom/We buy a lot of clothes but don’t really need ‘em/Things we buy to cover up what’s inside/Cause they made us hate ourselves and love they wealth/That’s why shorty hollerin’ ‘Where the ballers at?/Drug dealer buy Jordans/Crackhead buy crack/And the white man get paid off all of that
But I ain’t even gonna act holier than thou/Cause fuck it, I went to Jacob’s with twenty-five thou/Before I had a house and I’d do it again/Cause I want to be on 106 and Park pushing a Benz/I want to act ballerific like it’s all terrific/I got a couple past-due bills, I won’t get specific/I got a problem with spending before I get it/We all self-conscious, I’m just the first to admit it.”
