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Slap-Boxing With Jesus

T.I. Is The New MC Hammer

For all the shit-talking that goes on over here about Lil Wayne and his sub par rapping skills, quasi-homosexual relationship with his surrogate bunk buddy and apparent prostitute fetish [1], not too many people have “discussed” that other weak-ass rapper from the South, T.I. Granted, while our “newest” addition to our blogging circle [2] wrote some random-ass jibba jabba about him yesterday, I was emailed a while back from one of my female fans (albeit without a picture and/or phone number, but whatever) to talk about MC Rotisserie Chest, but at the time he wasn’t doing anything too grating other than popping up next to Dale Earnhardt, Jr. in those retarded Chevrolet commercials.

I’ve never understood the public’s infatuation with T.I. While I’m amazed that he’s become one of the few rappers that’s stayed in the public eye for the better part of this decade, I’ve never bought that whole “King Of The South” bullshit for a second, especially after I saw him doing the Kid ‘N Play dance with Beenie Man in that goofy-ass video for “I’m Serious.” Even after his first shit sammich went double plastic wood grain, he managed to stick around long enough to put out three more abominations, each one sounding worse, yet inexplicably selling better, than its predecessor.

Back in the day, everybody harped on MC Hammer’s decisions to promote poison like Taco Bell and Pepsi, when what they failed to realize was that Hammer was onto something back then that is more prevalent now than it’s ever been: there’s more guap to be made in Hollywood than there is in rap. Ironically, a few years after Hammer faded into obscurity, Method Man, Redman and Snoop Dogg were pushing off bum wines like St. Ides, while Mack 10 and Fat Joe were trying not to pass out while squeezing their fat asses into the red and yellow lions for that Sprite take on Voltron. Hammerman was the predecessor for shit like Andre 3000 and David Banner’s dumbass cartoons. In that sense, T.I. should thank the Funky Headhunter for being rap’s media pariah, because if not for him jumping off buildings and using his parachute pants to float down, the paleface TIs that run corporate America wouldn’t have been dumb enough to pay a former crack peddler to endorse their gas-guzzling wares to our demographic. On a semi-related note, why the fuck do I always see that commercial during an episode of Soul Train or some shit? I never see NBC playing that dumb shit during Heroes or Dateline. The only other time I do catch it is when I see modern-day minstrels like King Booker on WWE Smackdown!, but I digress.
 
I will give Clifford points however for Charles Oakleying the fuck out of that other shitbag rapper’s career, Lil’ Flip. If he didn’t go to his hometown, slap the ever-loving shit out of him in front of his friends and then make records about it with DJ Drama, we probably would have had to suffer through another bullshit song like “Sunshine.” And he was partly responsible for bringing the whole “make it rain” movement to the public eye. Had his bottom bitch Philant Johnson not gotten ethered on the highway last year (in probably a Chevy nonetheless), we may have not seen some hilariously fucked up shit like “Pacman” Jones throwing $81,000 at a stripper, then smacking the flames out of her ass when she got the gall to pick the money up in Las Vegas a few months back.

If T.I. and Lil Wayne are supposedly the best things the South has to offer to hip-hop, their detractors won’t have to be complaining about their musical taste for too long. If anything, Clifford more or less resembles a younger version of Grandpa Simpson today: middling rhyming skills, but the inane ability to appear in advertisements for cracka-ass companies. Hell, if he could do cheerleader moves on roller skates in ATL and run around with a waxed turkey-looking torso in that new shitty video of his, I wouldn’t be surprised if I saw him in the future gyrating in some Doc Martens and zebra-print Speedos a la “Pumps And A Bump.” Pause to all of that of course.

[1] I wonder if he was talking to Trina - or at least a woman - on that song. And exactly what the fuck does a “flange” have to do with the song? Southern rap these days...

[2] Exactly how many bloggers do we have now?
 

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