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Rapper’s bark reduced to confusing whimper on ‘Boatlift’

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Also by Steve Lampiris:

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Forest Art 'leaves' viewers thinking (February 19, 2008)
Rockers' latest album 'Feasts' on listeners' senses (February 7, 2008)
Band eulogizes Grateful Dead in concert (February 6, 2008)

by Steve Lampiris

Thursday, November 29, 2007

Rap artist Pitbull's The Boatlift would have made an interesting instrumental album, pure and simple. The actual music is good for background noise (more on that later), but the lyrics are completely immaterial. As Pitbull himself states so eloquently on the final song "Mr. 305" (one of three a capella tracks), "The flow is retarded." Yeah, that's no joke, as it sums up the album rather succinctly. After giving this a listen twice through, there is no hint on why it is called The Boatlift. Sadly, however, that is perhaps the most logical thing about this hourlong commercial.

There is no reason, logical or otherwise, why a rapper as bad as Pitbull has three a capella tracks here. He cannot rap to a beat, so why did he think he could rap to silence? The only thing the silence accomplishes is to show Pitbull has less rhythm than a nerd on the dance floor. Nevermind the wordplay — his lyrics don't matter on any level. English or Spanish, the words are utterly irrelevant. Literally, a handful of songs are nothing more than a beat and Pitbull (and, of course, guest) chanting Spanglish for three-and-a-half minutes.

The (unintentionally) funniest moments on the album are when Pitbull or said irrelevant guest tries to be clever. Case in point, listen to "Candy Man," where Pitbull states, "It's sorta like golf when I'm swingin' this iron/ But even Tiger Woods has his off days/ And me, I've had my soft days." I'm not honestly sure where to begin explaining how ridiculous that is. At least when Jay-Z compared himself to Michael Jordan on "The Best of Both Worlds," there was a legitimate argument that could be made to that egoist comment; here, it would have made as much sense for Pitbull to state he can turn water into Cristal. At least the production is decent, right?

The all-star list of producers here would argue that, even if the lyrics are stupid, the beats are "ill." It's too bad Lil Jon and Swizz Beatz, among others, phone in their production. Nothing here is innovative or even hints at creativity, not even the obvious Cuban influences make any song stand out musically. Certainly, the beats will get people moving in a club, but they are forgettable just as soon as the song ends. In short, the percussion and samples are enjoyable for the sake of being fun, but their existence ends right there.

Despite all that negativity, there are two positive aspects in the album. One is the runtime; Unlike most rap albums, this disc does not approach the 80-minute mark and overstay its welcome. The other is that this collection is devoid of skits that are not funny the first time they're heard.

That said, I would call this, far and away, the worst album of the year, but this is not music —qualifying it as such would be like qualifying Spam as meat. Forget the stereotype of emo music; if you listen to The Boatlift, you truly do hate yourself.

1/2 star out of 5

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