In 2004, Chris Rock released his brilliant stand-up DVD, Never Scared. During one particularly memorable seven-minute segment, he delivers an insightful (and hilariously obscene) evaluation of the evolution of hip-hop:

“In the old days, it was easy to defend rap music, intellectually… and I love all the rappers today, but it’s hard to defend ‘I got hoes in different area codes.’  It’s hard to defend ‘Move bitch, get out the way.’  ‘Well as you can see, there’s a bitch in his way that he needs to move, thus the term “move bitch, get out the way.” You need to open YOUR eyes so you can get the bitches out of YOUR way!’”

This is one of my favorite stand-up bits of all time in part because Twelve-Year-Old Me actually tried to defend these very songs when they came on Jam’n 94.5 as I rode in the passenger seat of my dad’s Jeep. “Do you really think you’ll still enjoy listening to this guy’s crap ten years from now?” he asked me back in 2002. At the time, I didn’t really give it much thought because I was, as I said, twelve, and ten years was simply an inconceivable amount of time for me. But now, with the release of Ludacris’ 1.21 Gigawatts: Back To The First Time, I can finally answer my dad’s question. Unfortunately the answer would make him smug as hell.

Before going in on Gigawatts (which is supposedly somehow based on Back To The Future), I want to start off by saying that the Ludacris I grew up with was one of the best comedic voices in hip-hop throughout most of the 00’s. “Roll Out,” “Stand Up,” “Get Back” and their accompanying videos still retain all of their laugh- and booty-shaking-inducing potency. Sadly, the Ludacris we have today is too pissed off to really try being funny or even likable, and rather than silence the personalities he uses the mixtape to take shots at, he may just provide them with more ammo.

I’ve reviewed enough crappy Atlanta mixtapes in the past few months that I’m not going to waste much space describing the poor quality of literally every beat on Gigawatts. What is worth mentioning, for example, is that on “Rich & Flexin’” (which starts with a clip of “Cry Me A River” and I don’t know why) Luda barely sounds the more coherent half of a duet with Waka Flocka Flame.  I suppose he names the next track “Mothafucka Can U Buy That” just to make sure we get the message that he’s very rich. Big whoop Luda.

The climax of the tape, and probably the entire reason for its existence, are the tracks “Bada Boom” and “Say It To My Face.” On the former, he somewhat convincingly counters Big Sean’s claims (backed by Drake) that Luda stole the Detroit MC’s “Supadupa” flow, but I couldn’t hold it together when Luda claims he’s “got more styles than any rapper in the game.” It’s like calling Eddie Murphy the most versatile actor in Hollywood. As for the other diss track, its target (who I guess said something mean about Luda on Twitter) is literally so unknown that you want to tweet “YOU LIAR” @Ludacris for the previous song’s line about not “shooting a mosquito with a cannon.”

The rest of the tape is highlighted by:

1. Gucci Mane unironically asking for “fries with that shake” about twenty-five times
2. A song so un-funnily misogynistic that Luda actually uses the phrase “showing her my O-face,” and
3. Wiz Khalifa rapping about weed.

Literally the only saving grace to be found on Gigawatts is the unchanged baritone of Luda’s voice, which harkens back to the days when he made us smile with lines about seeing “a big ol’ ass” instead of cringe with failed Office Space references. Or maybe we children of his generation have just matured. Either way, Gigawatts sucks.

2 / 5 bars

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