K-SCORE: 61
Rapper: Big Boi
I’ll be honest, I have only known about this song for a few weeks. It was introduced to me at a friend’s house, and for the most part I've only listened to it when I've been with this same friend. I remember it exclusively for its operatic, larger than life beat; I also don't think I could recite a single lyric for you. I anticipate Kyle's review to be very enlightening for me. Let's get to it!
-Mike
Antwan Andre Patton – so even though you call yourself Big Boi, you write a song highlighting the coincidence that you share the real last name with the legendary US military general… interesting. I’ve listened to “General Patton” a bunch now and concluded that there is no meaningful connection between you and the WWII leader. I docked some points from the start. Moving on.
Big Boi, if you were the brains behind this operation than you made some excellent choices (shutting up in the final minute being the greatest among them, but more on that later), and for that I am awarding you with the decent rating: 61.
“General Patton” has character, in just about every sense. Choosing the epic opera in the background makes it kind of fun to listen to your song. The thematic link between the opera and your lyrics is not nearly as strong as you’d like it to be, but the overall sound of the thing is decent. That being said, you didn’t write or record the opera, so some of the points are going to the song “General Patton,” but not you.
Mr. Patton, (I bet that stings, but you don’t have what it takes to be a citizen) you lost your remaining points by not telling me who you were so angry with. Don’t get me wrong, you’re entertaining. Your creative descriptions of disturbingly violently acts on some unknown offender would even have DMX doing a double take and declaring you the true, “whack ass ni**a” Though, I admit, your song does benefit from you being a creative lunatic as opposed to a furious one. You’re telling this mysterious “paperboy” to “pick on someone his own size” and because when he “f*cks around” he “gets killed,” and starts “bleeding from the spleen” with “emergency vehicles last seen speeding from the scene” … and you stay “so fresh and so clean.” Whoa. You have a vivid imagination and a gift for turning suspiciously specific violent threats into rhymes. So you get some credit for putting together two entertaining, diverse, and snappy verses, but the whole message would be much stronger if you even hinted at the basis for your threats.
And then in comes Big Rube “like an angel plucking puppet strings.” Big Rube, I don’t know who you are, or where you’re from, but will you be my friend? I would pay you to read things that I wrote aloud to people. I’m not intimidating, but, being as your voice is not of this world, I think you could get the job done. I’m thinking I’d dish out four-hundred dollars to be able to put you on the phone with the Time Warner Cable customer service representatives I have to talk to and just say “stop lyin’” to absolutely anything they say. You should stand outside courthouses whenever criminals go free and declare, “Sir Luscious puts his left foot forward and rides off into the horizon of infinite regression… victorious.” I’m pretty sure that sentence could melt the souls of the wicked and send them straight to hell. Your voice and message were more powerful than anything I’ve listened to for this blog so far. You’re a champ, Big Rube! May you forever stay “undefeated on the battlefield against the means of ignorance, greed and hatred.” Keep it up.
Whoever recorded that garbage about the rape-act David Blaine at the end of this song, get the hell out of here. You don’t belong anywhere near Big Rube, and that’s the truth. “And the truth is the only thing I can never be stripped of.”