What a bunch of fuck-ups

Right now I'm running a poll on my own site to determine which is the most highly anticipated of several rap albums that will supposedly be released in the next month or so. Choices include the new albums by the Wu-Tang Clan, Ghostface, Lil' Wayne, Nas, and Saigon.

As of right now, the Wu is winning what's turned out to be a tight three-way race between them, Lil' Wayne, and Nas. By comparison, people don't seem nearly as interested in the Ghostface and Saigon albums - though at least in the case of the Ghostface album, you have to think he'd be doing a lot better if he didn't have his own group to compete with. Hopefully, for his sake, this isn't also the case when it comes to actual album sales.

Barring some surge in voting by people who don't know from good rap music, it looks the Wu will have taken this poll when I suspend voting at the ass crack of noon Monday morning. Which is interesting, when you think that Lil' Wayne has been on the cover of XXL like five times this year, while the Wu has to settle for motherfucking URB, but I suppose that's a topic for another discussion.

The point here is that cracka-ass crackas love them some Wu, even to this day, despite the Wu's best efforts at sabotaging its own career over the past 10 years or so.

Take for example the run-up to to the release of 8 Diagrams. What a clusterfuck! A while before anyone had even heard anything from the album, there was already talk that Ghostface might not even appear on the album. Which, you'd have to think, was not exactly the best way to inspire confidence in the big comeback album - especially since Ghostface is arguably the only member of the group who hasn't been on a vacation up his own ass for the past several years now.

Then there was the first couple of tracks that leaked to the Internets. To be clear, I enjoy both of them more so than I've enjoyed anything that I've heard on the radio since I was in middle school. But I can't say that either of them is the song I'd put out if I was the Wu-Tang Clan trying to come off of a six-year hiatus. The one flips that same Bob James (or whatever it is) sample that jigs have been rappin' over since my parents were in high school. And the other one is basically them rapping over "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," with motherfucking Erykah Badu taking the chorus.

The fuck?

Where I differ with Raekwon, who's obviously bitter because he's probably been broke for years now, is that I do enjoy both of them. (In fact, I'm kinda glad the RZA would be hesitant to take production advice from Raekwon, given his post-OB4CL output.) I'm at a loss for how this is gonna get them back on MTV, but like I said, they're fortunate in that they remain ridonkulously popular amongst cracka-ass crackas. They don't play the Eagles on MTV, and they just sold more albums than Fiddy!

If anything, it's too bad that the Wu's career is always in such a state of disarray. Probably more so than anyone else in hip-hop, they have the potential to be a group like one of these older rock groups, where they can tour year in and year out and make ridonkulous sums of money. If only they could stop whining like little bitches and get it together.