After Jay-Z declared him "a breath of fresh air" and his debut album received three Grammy nods, Lupe Fiasco went back into the studio to create his sophomore offering, The Cool. In this SOHH exclusive, we talk to Lupe about his group project with Kanye and Pharrell, why he's ready for retirement and the reception of new his album.
Having just dropped his sophomore album this week, Lupe Fiasco is characteristically cool. He's not concerned with album sales and he's not making any bets. "No, no predictions," he tells SOHH. "I feel good though, I feel really good about it. The response from the peoples has been amazing. The reviews have been very, very good. It's a very well received album so that mission is complete. Now it's time to see if it sells what everybody is hoping it will sell. I don't really got no hopes."
Though he has no personal goals for first week sales, Lupe does agree that his album may be one of the best of 2007. "Yeah, I wouldn't say best, but good. Definitely in the running even outside of hip-hop."
On The Cool Lupe touches on various taboo subjects. On "Intruder Alert" he addresses the subject of rape, and on the highly criticized "Gotta Eat" he rhymes from the perspective of a cheeseburger.
"It's called imagination," he says in defense of the songs premise. "You should use it. The song is really about health. The hook is 'My man says feed me feed me when @#*$%s gotta eat that's when sh-t gets greasy.' You look at the health situation in the hoods and it's just bad. There's no Whole Foods. There's no nutrition. Nobody is vegetarians. It's cheeseburgers and steak sandwiches. We're slowing killing ourselves of heart disease and all that. If the bullets don't get you the diabetes will. It was basically just making that statement so that people can start having the conversation."
Lupe is already looking towards the release of his third and final LP. "One more... LupEnd is what it's actually called," he told SOHH. Im'a always perform until the day I die. It's just the industry of recorded music doesn't appeal to me. That dream of getting a record deal and all that is lost. I woke up from it. But in between time, in the meantime, you'll probably get a CRS album. But yeah, one more full length solo debut LP."
CRS, which stands for Child Rebel Soldiers, refers to the group that Lupe formed with fellow rappers/producers Kanye West and Pharrell Williams.
"We had the one record," he jokes. "The US Placers record with Tom Yorke and actually my girl Vashtie just did a dope video for that. It's pretty fresh. [Watch it here]. We're about, like, no songs deep. One song deep, a lot of ideas, a lot of conversations about how we want to roll out and what we want it to look like, what we want it to feel like. So we're in discussion right now but hopefully end of 08, we'll have something proper."
With so much talk of retirement in rap these days it's easy to question whether or not LupEnd will actually be the end for Fiasco. He assures us that it will. "Nah, if I go I'ma go. I just want to make sure I leave behind a legacy."
Source: SOHH
