![]() Tracks may contain explicit lyrics and content. “Know some who say life’s a bitch,” he raps on “The Race.” “Well, I’ma keep flirting. Click on any of the song titles or use the controls in the player below to listen to the album and then tell us if you think it’s HOT or NOT in our listener poll. But the sheer catchiness of the music-its sing-along choruses (“Black and Yellow”), its synthesizer sparkle (the benny blanco-produced “No Sleep”)-turn even his modest goals into the kind of anthems that elevate partying to a spiritual pursuit. ![]() Lyrically, he’s a charm offensive: He’ll be there when you call (“Roll Up”), he loves his camo shorts (“Taylor Gang”), and he wields his endless supply of joints like magic wands that, with a wave, can make the stress of daily life disappear (pretty much every song). ![]() “They say all I rap about is bitches and champagne,” he shrugs on the album-opening “When I’m Gone.” “You would too if every night you seen the same thing.” The difference with Wiz is that you can tell he’s enjoying it. And at a time when the luxurious melancholy of Drake was starting to cast its long, warm shadow over the culture, Wiz-like Snoop Dogg before him-presented himself as nothing more than a laidback dude looking for a good time. It’s a party-rap album that happily parlays party-rap traditions into modern pop songwriting and production, in ways that helped crack open the conversation for what pop and hip-hop hybrids could be. Wiz Khalifa’s breakthrough wafted so casually to the top of hip-hop’s 2011 heap it’s easy to miss how accomplished it actually was.
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