Back to hip-hop/rap this week, this time with Wale. Wale aka (get ready for this)....Olubowale Victor Akintimehin, is a young rapper out of Washington D.C. born in 1984 to Nigerian immigrants who had arrived in America only five years before. As the self proclaimed "Ambassador of Rap for the Capital," Wale has been writing and playing with music his whole life even after attending Robert Morris College and Virginia State on football scholarships, then transferring to Boise State. Eventually though he dropped out to pursue his recording career. Many of his early songs sampled 80's disco and go-go (a more raw sounding, percussion driven disco out of Washington) including the popular song "Dig Dug." Transitioning from the underground rapper that he once was, Wale has released two full length albums under Interscope "Attention Deficit" (2009) and "Ambition" (2011) along with many mixtapes one being "More About Nothing," a sequel to "The Mixtape About Nothing." Wale has recorded many famous songs with many other superstars including the likes of: Rick Ross, Meek Mill, Miguel, and many more. Songs like "Chain Music," "Lotus Flour Bomb," and "Ambition," were huge hits off of Ambition. What I also like about Wale is that many of the songs that he writes sound highly educated making me actually think about what he's saying, one of these songs being "The Problem," off of his most recent mixtape, "More About Nothing."
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(He makes an interesting comparison here that I had never noticed before)
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This is my personal favorite song because of the quality of lyrics in the extended intro and really the whole song in general. It's really quite surprising that this insight is coming from a modern artist especially a rapper.
Wale, only at the age of 28, has a very bright future in store for him especially if he continues to write and record with the quality he has now. And who knows, he might even get better.
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