Album review: Lil Wayne's 'I Am Not a Human Being'

Lil Wayne may boast that he’s not a human being, but the state of New York has other ideas. At press time, inmate No. 02616544L languishes in solitary confinement, finishing off an eight-month prison sentence and unable to sustain his notorious prolificacy.

Consisting of tracks allegedly intended for the indefinitely postponed “Tha Carter IV,” “I Am Not a Human Being” represents a stopgap effort, with Wayne mired in a peculiar stasis. Wildly profane, the New Orleans trickster ascended to hip-hop’s top spot through his surreal spontaneity and marathon recording sessions that yielded a singular eccentricity. But where it was once impossible to predict his next couplet, Wayne and his protégé Drake have calcified into a stiff simile-laden formalism that earned its own Twitter meme earlier this year, with Internet nerds vying to best mimic the Young Money lyrical style.

It’s unclear whether the creative languor stems from the inherent commercial pressure of being the Young Money meal ticket or whether Wayne has exhausted his ideas after compressing a career’s worth of songs into three years. Paired on a generic trio of tracks with smug aftershave-underling Drake, “Gonorrhea,” “Right Above It” and “With You” achieve a bizarre solipsism, with Wayne actively aping his most slavish imitator. And on bachelor ode “I’m Single,” flush pocket paean “Bill Gates” and the extraterrestrial title track, Wayne’s done this shtick better before. He might want to repudiate his own humanity, but on “I’m Not a Human Being,” Wayne reveals he’s mortal after all.

-- Jeff Weiss

Lil Wayne
“I Am Not a Human Being”
Cash Money/Universal
Two stars

RELATED: Lil Wayne 'didn't want to disappear' while behind bars, debuts new album

Comments

[Lauren baby]

waynes new album is awesome, he haas always been getting better, and its showwn here nikkaas!

[J.J]

Just say it is the worst album of the decade

[Gman]

Wow it looks like you literally just used a thesaurus on every word just to find a more fancy word

[Andrew]

This is a great unbiased review. You should definitely question the creativity of an artist whose been going strong for over a decade.I mean your right, he should conform to Jeff Weiss' ideas on hip-hop. It's obvious you keeping all the creativity to yourself "he's mortal after all" very original. Great review.

[d]

this article is very bad, you can tell the writer does not know rap music at all....

[kevyn medley]

wat5 poppin blood dat 5 5poppin 6 droppin

[mark shapiro]

if this is music, then Im king kong...what junk and calling it junk is a compliment..Im thinking of wearing chains, cornhoe hair and get a dark tan and then rap about rape, arson, murder and extortion and get rich and then have some reviewer call it something close to mozart.

[alexis brown]

i looooooooooooove you

[alexis brown]

i lov you sssooooooooo much

[Pale Horse]

On August 4, 2010, Billboard magazine announced that Lil Wayne would release an EP called I Am Not a Human Being and would have a single from the EP called "Right Above It". The single debuted on DJ Funkmaster Flex's show, which Lil Wayne called and gave an interview. The album is a prelude to Lil Wayne's upcoming Tha Carter IV.[2]

[KJ]

KENYAFAH AND ALICIA