KEY POINTS:
KANYE WEST
Graduation (Universal)
Verdict: Chicago hit-maker delivers third masterpiece from the comfort of his crib
Herald Rating: ****
50 CENT
Curtis (Universal)
Verdict: Formerly charismatic New Yorker gets bogged down in boredom
Herald Rating: **
This year 50 Cent claimed that if Kanye West's new album outsold his, he would quit music. Judging by their efforts here, he might be up for an early retirement. Where West has quietly reinvented himself, Fiddy has resorted to an unsuccessful gangster blueprint that ultimately weighs him down.
West always looks as though he can't sit still. Blame his childlike enthusiasm, his chest-pounding self-love, his irrepressible comments - about everything from George Bush to his so-called market nemesis (if you believe their "beef" is anything other than a marketing ploy).
So it comes as a pleasant surprise to find the edgy one has relaxed. On his third album Graduation he still addresses his own talent in the same sentence as the Almighty but compared with The College Dropout and its brilliant follow-up Late Registration, Graduation is a laidback affair.
That's not to say West has got lazy. He's still a premier rapper and quality producer whose attention to detail makes this a pleasure to listen to through earphones. Graduation is a lusher, more luxurious album, marked by a synthy, late 80s sound and a noticeably more relaxed rapping style. That mood also permeates the party tracks like the Daft Punk-sampling Stronger, Good Life with T Pain, where West proclaims "it feels like Miami" or the warm, string-soaked Flashing Lights. He's even made over his formerly preppy image, trying on a much more ubiquitous puffer jackets and bling look, while referencing everyone from Kate Moss to Louis Vuitton in his rhymes.
Fans hoping for an album bursting with West's comically big ego won't be disappointed by Barry Bonds: "My head's so big you can't sit behind me." But he's at his best on the self-flagellating You Can't Tell Me Nothing, a track that proves he's still not quite come to terms with his mortality, let alone the pressures of fame: "I told God I'll be back in a second, man, it's so hard not to act reckless."
Those lyrical themes are also the album's sticking point.
The majority of West's rhymes are about him. At first listen his newfound restraint could be interpreted as producing a less compelling album. But West has already proved he's at the top - now he's content to enjoy it.
Fiddy is also enjoying his time at the top after becoming one of the richest men in hip-hop. Or is he? Curtis is named after him for a reason. This is the sound of the man with everything but creative juice. Instead, 50 Cent rehashes the staples of G-Unit sound, a monotonous procession of machine-generated beats and rhymes preoccupied with sex, money and status. And he doesn't sound as though he's having a particularly good time doing it.
Instead he sounds stale, resorting to an almost cartoonish level of menace on My Gun Go Off and a textbook gangster aesthetic everywhere else. Even on Fully Loaded Clip he doesn't sound nearly as powerful as he used to.
Yes, the beats share the slick G-Unit sound but Fiddy almost sounds bored and lackadaisical when he sings "cash is flowin' fo' sure" on Movin' On Up.
The result is nowhere near as engaging or contagious as Get Rich Or Die Tryin' or as brutal as its follow-up, The Massacre. Gone are the catchy singalong choruses, the hungry swagger he once possessed. Only I Get Money comes close.
Even Justin Timberlake's obligatory appearance with Timbaland on AYO Technology comes across as a try-hard stripper song.
Looks like Kanye's the winner here.
