Pusha T - It’s Almost Dry (Discussion Thread)

[Uchiha God]

 

[aceboon]

 

[Mike Wins]

One of the best rap videos in a minute

 

[ReasonableMatic]

Pusha T interview about new album It’s Almost Dry and working with Kanye West

 

[Don Jesus]

The guy is a caricature of himself. He's a mediocre Jay-Z impersonator in lyrical form. The irony is all these cats talkin this laughable "Push makes music for street nikkas" ignore that his resurgence is tied directly to the same hiphop blog CACs they selectively dismiss when one of them pens a review they don't like. White boys loved the Clipse and the Dips - both had significant cache among the hipster doofus set. And if you like Push, cool - like the nikka and his music. Some loser negged me talking about me being a drake stan when I've never listened to a drake album on purpose in my life. Which is the most fascinating aspect of all this: social media and online communities gradually transformed the way we discuss music. People latch onto rappers like brands, and discuss their albums like one would do the latest iPhone - they start from the assumption that, just as the artists claims, the album is a classic. Any attempt to discuss things about it that might not be so good is dismissed as hating or "CAC and c00n" opinions. Or if you're critical it must be because you like another rival rapper. None of these nikkas are interesting enough to support to that tribal extent. It's hilarious to observe but ultimately warped.

Personally, Pusha T kills me because he fails to hit any of the kind of notes I like from rap. There's swagged out, Black Super Hero rap - music that just makes you feel cool because of the sheer arrogance and attitude of the MC. There's thoughtful rap, that delves into day-to-day issues and such. And there's introspective street nikka rap, full of intricate details and reflections and insights into hood lifestyles. Push does none of that. He sells coke in repetitive "clever" bars and is very disgusted by snitches. He is really into watches and name brands and offended when you don't have an adequate grasp of the finest of those things. He has the swagger of RG III if Griffin had a couple hood adjacent friends who sold dope. He sounds like the lost member of Camp Lo. He tried to go pop and it didn't work. He penned corny McDonalds and Arby's commercials. He raps about cocaine in a fukking Arby's commercial. He's a caricature of himself. Like the Henny Youngman or Milton Berle of cocaine rap. I just flew in from Mexico with the bricks, and boy are my arms tired. Take my coke, please! He called himself Cocaine's Dr. Seuss, but he's more Daffy Duck, just tapdancing on wax, spiitin bar after bar about cocaine trafficking while the CACs beam in delight, as if he's performing cocaine c00nery.

The idea of having to be from the street to really get Push is also hilarious. The nikka looks like half a herb and he's the right hand to a legit c00n. And his fanbase is a bunch of CACs and suburban nikkas. Who are yall kidding with this nonsense. The internet done really convinced yall you from the street? That you understand the ins and out of dope distributing? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

To his credit Pusha T has done one thing exceedingly well: kept his feet in room with industry influencers. So even though hardly anyone cares about his mid ass music, it's always be well reviewed and promoted due to his associations and connections, and he'll be able to land shyt like a Jimmy Fallon performance (and good lord was that a swaggerless performance). But the dude is boring as can be and has very little presence on top of his woeful lack of substance.

This opinion really shouldn't upset you. There are 100 other fanboys in the thread to comfort you if you love this lame nikka. Just keep listening to the album and calling it a classic. You'll be okay.

great post

i hate when nikkas say “why switch it up when he does what he does well” well maybe because he should avoid becoming a caricature for white audiences?

alot of these rappers today have majority white fanbases because they are one dimensional caricature rappers and white people love black people that are easy to compartmentalize.

people on here have low IQs, they think being tired of push rapping about coke means that we want him to mumble rap or some shyt

just means we want the criminal raps to have more depth…like rap about your son and how he influences you to leave the life…or how you lost your parents and how that was a villain origin to your fictional story of being a kingpin… theres ways to expand your subject matter without going all the way like Rebirth by Wayne…. but you nikkas is black and white with your logic.. no nuance at all

if nas made illmatic over and over again, he’d be jeru da damaja

if jay made reasonable doubt over and over again, he’d be o.c.

rap subject matter development is dead because these nikkas scared to lose their core audience. which exposes their lack of artistry dimension. kanye one of the last ones who wasnt scared

that being said Push’s music and branding is top notch… even though he’ll never top Daytona

 

[winb83]

great post

i hate when nikkas say “why switch it up when he does what he does well” well maybe because he should avoid becoming a caricature for white audiences?

alot of these rappers today have majority white fanbases because they are one dimensional caricature rappers and white people love black people that are easy to compartmentalize.

people on here have low IQs, they think being tired of push rapping about coke means that we want him to mumble rap or some shyt

just means we want the criminal raps to have more depth…like rap about your son and how he influences you to leave the life…or how you lost your parents and how that was a villain origin to your fictional story of being a kingpin… theres ways to expand your subject matter without going all the way like Rebirth by Wayne…. but you nikkas is black and white with your logic.. no nuance at all

if nas made illmatic over and over again, he’d be jeru da damaja

if jay made reasonable doubt over and over again, he’d be o.c.

rap subject matter development is dead because these nikkas scared to lose their core audience. which exposes their lack of artistry dimension. kanye one of the last ones who wasnt scared

that being said Push’s music and branding is top notch… even though he’ll never top Daytona

Chill. Pusha cool doing what he does. He’s mastered his lane. Put out two amazing albums back to back. I been bumping this nonstop since it released and at this point there isn’t a bad track on it to me.

 

[Shadow King]

great post

i hate when nikkas say “why switch it up when he does what he does well” well maybe because he should avoid becoming a caricature for white audiences?

alot of these rappers today have majority white fanbases because they are one dimensional caricature rappers and white people love black people that are easy to compartmentalize.

people on here have low IQs, they think being tired of push rapping about coke means that we want him to mumble rap or some shyt

just means we want the criminal raps to have more depth…like rap about your son and how he influences you to leave the life…or how you lost your parents and how that was a villain origin to your fictional story of being a kingpin… theres ways to expand your subject matter without going all the way like Rebirth by Wayne…. but you nikkas is black and white with your logic.. no nuance at all

if nas made illmatic over and over again, he’d be jeru da damaja

if jay made reasonable doubt over and over again, he’d be o.c.

rap subject matter development is dead because these nikkas scared to lose their core audience. which exposes their lack of artistry dimension. kanye one of the last ones who wasnt scared

that being said Push’s music and branding is top notch… even though he’ll never top Daytona

There's wanting more introspection/emotional depth from a capable rapper...


And then there's the hatred that nikka spewed for Push.

 

[Crumple]

Congrats to Pusha T and good music on this release.

It's probably the best "mainstream" Hip Hop album I've heard in 15 years.

It definitely restored the "feeling" the right way.

Pretty much the whole album goes, from to back.

Plus Kanye and Pharrell on production?

On time like an Amazon truck



Wait does he mean Amazon.com corporate Bezos big biz delivery?....



Or does he mean Amazon trucks in the actual Amazon regions in South America to pick up.....



Edit - Malice is a top tier emcee and human being.

 

[Walt]

great post

i hate when nikkas say “why switch it up when he does what he does well” well maybe because he should avoid becoming a caricature for white audiences?

alot of these rappers today have majority white fanbases because they are one dimensional caricature rappers and white people love black people that are easy to compartmentalize.

people on here have low IQs, they think being tired of push rapping about coke means that we want him to mumble rap or some shyt

just means we want the criminal raps to have more depth…like rap about your son and how he influences you to leave the life…or how you lost your parents and how that was a villain origin to your fictional story of being a kingpin… theres ways to expand your subject matter without going all the way like Rebirth by Wayne…. but you nikkas is black and white with your logic.. no nuance at all

if nas made illmatic over and over again, he’d be jeru da damaja

if jay made reasonable doubt over and over again, he’d be o.c.

rap subject matter development is dead because these nikkas scared to lose their core audience. which exposes their lack of artistry dimension. kanye one of the last ones who wasnt scared

that being said Push’s music and branding is top notch… even though he’ll never top Daytona

Precisely. OB4CL came out in 1995. There's nothing new, innovative, or particularly interesting about cocaine and crack rap in 2022 - so many years removed from the crack era that the raps are closer to low tier Blaxploitation than whatever this half-baked "Scorsese" talking point is the stans have latched onto. What made Ghost and Rae interesting - and credible - is the drugs were a jumping off point for stories that connected the drugdealing to its circumstances and consequences. The drugs were secondary. Pusha T distills his product to its crudest form, where the drugs are primary, with no interesting or subversive spin. He's figuratively selling his audience baking soda.

Way back I was at a lounge with my homeboy - he knew the owner and we got set up with a spot to watch the NBA playoffs. At some point Jay-Z's Encore came on and the bouncer got into the song, and at some point he was chanting along with the lyrics "hova hova hova" while throwing a Roc symbol up. One of the most loserish things I'd ever seen in my life. I started to see that rap had evolved into a warped but probably inevitable marriage between counterculture and extreme capitalism (two things that undercut each other) - popular rappers as megalomaniacal mega-church pastors spitting prosperity gospel raps, for desperate audiences in search of escape, delusion, and a sense of belonging. The fans were buying into an identity rather than appreciating music. Things continued in that fashion, only got worse in fact. And it makes discussing the music simply on its merits more contentious because you're not just critiquing a song or an album, but a shared belief, a club in which people have become invested, a community even. Like you can't even point out that rap has moved so far from deeply black perspective ( it used to be damn near inaccessible to non-blacks) to a mainstream white conservative perspective while simultaneously branding itself as more excellently black than ever. People will throw a fit. The most popular rapper of the past 15 years is a rambling bozo who said slavery was a choice, openly supported a regressive scumbag president, dyed his hair blond and rocked blue contacts, put Kenny G on his album, and started making music with paint-by-numbers Christian messaging. It gets no whiter. A lot of this stuff is a weird sort of aspirational minstrelsy under a flimsy pro-black branding. And the funny shyt is these cats are a front for white people who are pushing product using their brand. People really believe kanye makes all these beats, man. It's hilarious. You can practically hear the soulless white boys who are making some of this music. But to do so you'd have to really know pay attention to music, rather than being invested in a brand that reaffirms some delusion you have about what it means to rock with it. Anyway, Push's coke raps give me the same feeling the worst of Jay's megalomaniacal mega-church pastor prosperity gospel songs do: it makes me think, "listening to this makes me feel like a fukkin loser." The exact opposite of what the best rap does.

 

[Chip Skylark]

Great album! But Infrared came on randomly today then Hard Piano. Revisited Daytona and every song is 4 damn near 5.

 

[Chip Skylark]

Congrats to Pusha T and good music on this release.

It's probably the best "mainstream" Hip Hop album I've heard in 15 years.

It definitely restored the "feeling" the right way.

Pretty much the whole album goes, from to back.

Plus Kanye and Pharrell on production?

On time like an Amazon truck



Wait does he mean Amazon.com corporate Bezos big biz delivery?....



Or does he mean Amazon trucks in the actual Amazon regions in South America to pick up.....



Edit - Malice is a top tier emcee and human being.

Lol are you serious? I get you said mainstream hip hop album also. There’s been A LOT of great mainstream hip hop albums since 2007 lmfao

 

[Tetris v2.0]

Way back I was at a lounge with my homeboy - he knew the owner and we got set up with a spot to watch the NBA playoffs. At some point Jay-Z's Encore came on and the bouncer got into the song, and at some point he was chanting along with the lyrics "hova hova hova" while throwing a Roc symbol up. One of the most loserish things I'd ever seen in my life. I started to see that rap had evolved into a warped but probably inevitable marriage between counterculture and extreme capitalism (two things that undercut each other) - popular rappers as megalomaniacal mega-church pastors spitting prosperity gospel raps, for desperate audiences in search of escape, delusion, and a sense of belonging. The fans were buying into an identity rather than appreciating music. Things continued in that fashion, only got worse in fact. And it makes discussing the music simply on its merits more contentious because you're not just critiquing a song or an album, but a shared belief, a club in which people have become invested, a community even.

I like this Push album lol, but this post and specifically this part is the absolute fukking truth.com

 

[Crumple]

Lol are you serious? I get you said mainstream hip hop album also. There’s been A LOT of great mainstream hip hop albums since 2007 lmfao

Okay true, I can appreciate that.

To me no where near this level. Because
- Pusha T's attention to his craft
- Jay feature
- only Ye and Pharrell on the boards
- some seriously angry rhymes
- incredible music videos
- his respect to the greats ...Schooly D Flows on Neck and Wrist

 

[TheDarceKnight]

 

[Yecht]

Precisely. OB4CL came out in 1995. There's nothing new, innovative, or particularly interesting about cocaine and crack rap in 2022 - so many years removed from the crack era that the raps are closer to low tier Blaxploitation than whatever this half-baked "Scorsese" talking point is the stans have latched onto. What made Ghost and Rae interesting - and credible - is the drugs were a jumping off point for stories that connected the drugdealing to its circumstances and consequences. The drugs were secondary. Pusha T distills his product to its crudest form, where the drugs are primary, with no interesting or subversive spin. He's figuratively selling his audience baking soda.

Way back I was at a lounge with my homeboy - he knew the owner and we got set up with a spot to watch the NBA playoffs. At some point Jay-Z's Encore came on and the bouncer got into the song, and at some point he was chanting along with the lyrics "hova hova hova" while throwing a Roc symbol up. One of the most loserish things I'd ever seen in my life. I started to see that rap had evolved into a warped but probably inevitable marriage between counterculture and extreme capitalism (two things that undercut each other) - popular rappers as megalomaniacal mega-church pastors spitting prosperity gospel raps, for desperate audiences in search of escape, delusion, and a sense of belonging. The fans were buying into an identity rather than appreciating music. Things continued in that fashion, only got worse in fact. And it makes discussing the music simply on its merits more contentious because you're not just critiquing a song or an album, but a shared belief, a club in which people have become invested, a community even. Like you can't even point out that rap has moved so far from deeply black perspective ( it used to be damn near inaccessible to non-blacks) to a mainstream white conservative perspective while simultaneously branding itself as more excellently black than ever. People will throw a fit. The most popular rapper of the past 15 years is a rambling bozo who said slavery was a choice, openly supported a regressive scumbag president, dyed his hair blond and rocked blue contacts, put Kenny G on his album, and started making music with paint-by-numbers Christian messaging. It gets no whiter. A lot of this stuff is a weird sort of aspirational minstrelsy under a flimsy pro-black branding. And the funny shyt is these cats are a front for white people who are pushing product using their brand. People really believe kanye makes all these beats, man. It's hilarious. You can practically hear the soulless white boys who are making some of this music. But to do so you'd have to really know pay attention to music, rather than being invested in a brand that reaffirms some delusion you have about what it means to rock with it. Anyway, Push's coke raps give me the same feeling the worst of Jay's megalomaniacal mega-church pastor prosperity gospel songs do: it makes me think, "listening to this makes me feel like a fukkin loser." The exact opposite of what the best rap does.

Nobody reading that essay my guy