When the future of Hip Hop was in serious jeopardy, around 2007, little known North Carolina rapper J Cole released his The Come Up, and cemented himself at the forefront of the future of hip hop. Ranging from deeply personal, to ill brags, to hopeful aspirations being king (thanks to an adopted persona of Simba of Lion King fame), it was critically acclaimed and started off a trifecta of some of the best mixtapes in recent memory. While working on his next mixtape, The Warm Up, a leaked song got the attention of legend Jay Z, who made him the first member of his new record label Roc Nation in 2009. Followed up by Friday Night Lights in 2010, all was set for Cole to release his debut LP to the world that winter.
Then…nothing. Delay after delay after delay plagued Cole’s schedule, and the buzz was dying. When he finally put out one single ‘Who Dat’, it failed to gather any sort of mainstream attention that Jay Z wanted, so the album got pushed back even more. Finally, after nearly two years of sitting on the sideline, Cole somehow managed to put out Cole World: The Sideline Story (get it)? Though somehow Cole went from emotional to wimpy, and the few tracks the took off his mixtapes were not the strongest.
Also, can I just bring something up? Why does J Cole look like he’s about to cry in every single picture? He looks like Eeyore, straight up.
The album suffers from three main problems:
1. Cole doesn’t sound hungry throughout the entire album. Listening to it from start to finish, you can clearly tell what songs were written in the early stages of recording, and which ones were written when he just wanted to get the album out.
2. There is way too much filler. It bloats the albums to be unbearably long. The LP would’ve been a great EP. When your album is 60 minutes, and feels like it’s 75, there’s a problem.
3. There is way too much appeal to the mainstream. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it feels like Cole was forced into it (similar to Lupe Fiasco and Lasers). Despite Cole’s claim to be 100% behind the final product, compared to his earlier work, it seems far toio poppy.
Cole self produces most of the album, and most of it holds up. Though at times it seems too melodramatic, making the subject matter of songs seems too over the top, and they lose some of their meaning.
‘Lost Ones’ is the perfect example of this. J Cole harnesses his inner Common and laments unwanted pregnancy by taking on both sides of a couple (he raps as a boyfriend in the first verse, and his pregnant girlfriend in the second). While conceptually great, the execution is sloppy. Cole comes off perfectly as the deadbeat-boyfriend, but unintentionally hilarious as the girl . The overdramatic beat doesn’t help, since it sounds like the score to a chick flick more than a hip hop beat. ‘Nobody’s Perfect’ is the type of song for girls who keep a candy bar in their glove compartment. The beat is nice for R ‘n B, which is fine since it features R ‘n B legend Missy Elliot, but it’s so cliché and pop driven, it is hardly worth multiple listens. It should’ve been left on the cutting room floor.
‘Lights Please’, a song taken from his Warm Up mixtape, continues the trend of excellent concepts, but less-than-perfect execution. A ode to ignorant women, Cole comes off whiny as he complains about his girl who only wants to have fun, instead of trying to understand the world’s hardship. ‘In the Morning’, a song reused off his Friday Night Lights mixtape, features his rival Drake to deliver a song with more estrogen than is in the crowd of the Oprah Winfrey show. Drake ups the wimpy quota when he raps “Yeah, and if you gotta leave for work, I'll be right here in the same bed that you left me in” to the girl he had just met the night before. I know this made the cut just because it has Drake on it, but really?
Speaking of high-profile guests, ‘Can’t get enough’ features hit maker Trey Songz and a beat that sounds like an R Kelly song that would’ve been dated in 2003. It’s commercial fluff (no wonder it was a single). ‘Mr. Nice Watch’ is a song that Jay Z literally decided to get on during the final mix. J and Jay spit about how nice their watches are. That’s something I want to hear from Jay, not J. Jay slays Cole’s first two verses with his opening couplet alone “I got a Hublot, I call it Tebow, I strap that bitch with a gator band, Y'all niggas ball half-time, y'all niggas like the Gator band”. It features some euro-trash beat. ‘Cole World’ is a bland brag track. I would comment on it, but I can’t even remember it.
Then comes the good. ‘Dollar and a Dream III’ has a Cole that sounds a hungry as ever, and beckons back to his Simba persona. The overly dramatic beat fits the song, and it shows Cole at his peak. He knows he’s close to becoming huge, and it shows how bad he wants it. ‘Sideline Story’ continues this theme in a more depressing light of how conflicting fame can be, whether emotionally or socially. Depressing keys help aid the mood of the song, making it emotional without making Cole seem like a Pansy.
‘Never Told’ is Cole’s view on cheating from nearly all angles. However, the peak of the song comes when he laments how he saw his own father cheating and never told anyone (hence the title). ‘Breakdown’ is a culmination of all of Cole’s burdens: growing up in the hood, his non-existent father, his struggles through the rap game. It all comes together to create a classic Cole song.
The emotional Cole has to take a quick break when the braggadocio persona comes up. ‘Rise and Shine’ switches between making a name for himself and dissing all that stand in his way. It’s great, except for the beat that feels like every single other orchestral beat on the album. ‘God’s Gift’ has a beautifully soul-sampled beat that harkens back to the early days of Kanye West. Cole thanks god for his rapping ability, and continues the ‘Dollar and a Dream’ theme of he changed everyone’s mind of who he is. He even laughs about how Jay Z dismissed him earlier “Jigga wouldn't even take my CD when he seen me, Two years later we made it on, on to the Blueprint”. ‘Who Dat’, which was released nearly a year ago, has a Cole at his hungriest. With a marching band vibe, and ill brag rhymes it still amazes me how this didn’t blow up. It’s restricted to a bonus track, but it should’ve made the final cut.
The two other bonus tracks are forgettable. ‘Daddy’s Little Girl’ has one of the most annoying and depressing beats I have ever heard, and continues the ‘Lights Please’ theme, that wasn’t welcome there. ‘Work Out’ is a generic single, but for what it is, it isn’t bad. It’s just not what I want to hear from someone with this much Talent.
All and all the Cole World is average. Too much fluff, not enough substance. The beats can get annoying and this work has some of the corniest lines I have ever heard, especially “Cole’s heatin up like left over lasagna”. I want to know who was sitting in the studio when he recorded that. Because I were there, I would’ve stopped the recording, and smacked the shit outta him. Still, the old Cole still shines through the second half of the disk. Still, I’d buy it. He’s a great artist who needs support, and you could waste you money on much worse things.
Overall: Three Eeyores out of Five
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