Album Mashup No. 4

Beirut - "The Riptide"

"The Riptide" provides more of the same majestic brass-filled music that listeners enjoyed on "The Flying Club" but this time more quiet and mournful than its predecessors.

"A Candle's Fire", "Goshen", and "The Peacock" all sound a little bit too melancholic and understated to be on "The Flying Club" but for those reasons they are exceedingly beautiful. With that being said, the album as a whole is more minimalist than "[. . .] Club" but the restraint shows Condon's sophistication rather than any lack of enthusiasm.

The only part of "Riptide" that was surprising was the jaunty, electronic track "Santa Fe". Maybe this will foreshadow a willingness of Condon to embrace synths in the future. Who knows?

Grade: B+

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The Rapture - "In the Grace of your Love"

Though The Rapture have become closely identified with dance-punk on "In the [. . .]" the band seems to drift away from the genre. The album is definitely not as strong as their most recent release, 2006's "Pieces of People we Love". There seems to be a thinness, a frailness, that constantly makes the album feel like its missing something.

The song titles and the lyrics are extremely derivative and the band uses far too much repetition. The shallowest moments are tracks "Roller Coaster" and secondly "Miss You", a song with one of the most pedestrian titles imaginable. On the former, front man Luke Jenner compares life to a roller coaster. The only way that could be less original is if he compared life to a highway. Seriously.

The album has a few passable moments but overall it's extremely disappointing given the amount of hype it received. It was put out on DFA but it's not worthy of being associated with the major players on the venerable label. Five years is a long time between releases and it seems like they've lost their touch in that time. Maybe they'll rebound with their next LP.

Grade: F

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Lil Wayne - Tha Carter IV

Even if you're in love with Weezy, you'll have to admit that there needs to be a change to the carter formula. The fourth carter is more of the same Lil Wayne with nothing new to set it apart. Rhymes are just as ridiculous as you remember and Carter still gives off the vibe of trying way too hard to be clever at the expense of any real sincerity.

But then the one moment that Carter tries his best to say something without overly-silly rhymes it's hard to know just what the fuck he's talking about. Auto-tuned r&b track "How to Love" shows that the only lyrical ability Lil Wayne has is the silly kind.

The consistency is a double-edged sword though of course because hard-core Lil Wayne fans will probably eat this up anyway and their input certainly counts but there's no pushing of the envelope here. It's definitely appropriate to keep naming albums in a serial fashion (Tha Carter 2, 3, 4, etc.) because they feel so repetitive.

Grade: D