What to be Thankful for this week?
With many Lupe Fiasco fans anticipating the “Friend of The People” Mix-tape for a long period of time, the anticipation only grew when it was confirmed by Lupe himself, that it will drop on Thanksgiving day. XXL reviewed for FOTP “Look out New Lupe, you too Old Lupe, because Teenage Lupe is back in town and he’s pissed!” This mix-tape is to be the resurrection of the Lupe that first came out with the three Fahrenheit 1/15 trilogy mix-tapes. Many fans were disappointed with his lasted album LASERS, because Atlantic Records refused to release it for more than a year until he changed to accommodate to their need of a “commercial” sounding album, to heighten sales. After a struggle with angry fans, and a admittedly suicidal Lupe, it finally was released. Lupe promised his fans that his real sound in music will come out, and he is treating his fans to a mix-tape the same year of LASERS, and another album. The album is a continuation of Food & Liquor, the critically acclaimed album featuring Jay-Z and Kanye West. Food & Liquor received four Grammy nominations after debuting 8th in Billboard 200, and won a Grammy for “Daydreaming’” featuring Jill Scott. Back in 2006, Lupe Fiasco was virtually unknown to the public, but very well known among the hip-hop community. By the end of this year, Food & Liquor II : The Great American Album should be released, but it’s also from Atlantic Records, and with past struggles, and false promises, we can’t trust any dates. Lupe confirmed that when LASERS was released, F&L II was already half done, untouched by Atlantic Records… yet. Hopefully Lupe has proven he has a strong fan base for his content, and Atlantic Records will move away, maybe “Friend Of The People” this thursday will demonstrate that. From calling out the President, protesting along side Occupy cities, actively donating, to getting arrested just last week for carrying a shot gun, having trouble releasing LASERS, and still feeding fans with mix-tapes, features, politics, and social issues while touring, it has been a busy year and a half for Lupe Fiasco. The links will be dropped, so stay tuned.

Now onto Wale, one of Lupe’s accomplice in the movement “All City Chess Club” (To Be Discussed Another Time!), and he has tweeted that Bait remix will also be dropping this week! Promising it to be a classic, many fans of this song tweeted back in excitement. Recently Wale released Ambition, creating a phenomena among the young to be ambitious, to strive, and to better themselves. Some of the target audience is to make females see their worth as successful, independent, and to always be ambitious. Lotus Flower Bomb featuring Miguel is heard at every corner, read through tweeted lyrics, and updated facebook status’. The message is clear, young men want the ambitious girl, and the young women want to be that girl. Though Ambition as an album sounded very much influenced by his signers Maybach Music, you can still hear the old conformed Wale of his pervious very successful album Attention: Deficit in 2009, and his mix-tapes The Mixtape About Nothing (2008) Back to the Feature (2009) and More About Nothing (2010). Though many say Wale might be losing his original message of positivity and personal struggle, we can wait for that, because so far Ambition did debut at number 2 on the US Billboard 200 chart with 164,000 copies sold in its first week. Wale is now struggling with the same attacks every artist gets as soon as they get a bit more famous, where is the old you? A part of Lupe FIasco’s success is that though Atlantic Records messed with his sound, but he did not change his content. Lupe Fiasco managed to balance out the commercial radio, and the “deep” content. Many believe in Wale, his fan-base grew and is still growing at an incredible speed, and I doubt Wale would disappoint. We will have to wait and see.

PeaceSalaamShalom -@hijabiii