5 THINGS LIL WAYNE NEEDS TO AVOID DOING ON HIS NEW ALBUM, 'DEVOL'

5 Things Lil Wayne Should Avoid Doing on His Love Album, 'Devol'

April 18, 2012 - 4:04 pm by Chris Yuscavage TWITTER

Remember when Lil Wayne talked about his plans to record an album called Luv Sawngz a few years ago? He wanted to use Autotune—much like Kanye West did on his 2008 album, 808s & Heartbreak—to create an album full of R&B songs. "F--- it," he told Blender in 2008. "I'm not even a rapper. I'm past that…I'm an R&B singer now. Call me T-Wayne."

Fortunately, that album never saw the light of day. Unfortunately, though, the idea for it might be back again. During MTV's debut installment of their new show, Hip Hop POV, last week, Weezy appeared and talked about a new album called Devol that he's working on right now. According to him, it features a handful of tracks that he wrote while he was in jail in 2010 and they're all "love songs"—at least, by his standards. "What I mean by my version of love songs is meaning they're not saying, 'I love you,'" he said. "It's all material I did when I was locked up."

Um, okay? We're not exactly sure what to make of that explanation. But, we do know one thing: We hope this isn't Wayne's attempt to make Luv Sawngz under a different title! We also hope that this isn't going to be a corny concept record that falls flat and serves as a letdown after last year's Tha Carter IV. So to try and guide Wayne in the right direction, we put together a list of the 5 Things Lil Wayne Needs To Avoid Doing On His New Album, Devol. Stick to this script, Weezy, and we're sure that we'll love the album.—Chris Yuscavage

5 THINGS LIL WAYNE NEEDS TO AVOID DOING ON HIS NEW ALBUM, 'DEVOL'

DEVOL 1

1. Do not—do not, do not, do not!—use a vocoder or Autotune on even one single song on Devol. Don't you dare, Wayne! We know that you're going to be tempted to do it. But, if any of the songs included on Devol are actually "love songs," do us a favor and stay far, far away from the Vocoder and/or the Autotune software. It's played. It's tired. It's probably not going to sound good. And…yeah. It's just not what you should be doing right now. You had your time with voice-altering equipment in the past. Now, we'd suggest you stay away from it.

DEVOL 2

2. Don't make more than two songs that could be considered strip club anthems. When we heard that Weezy was making "love songs," we automatically thought about him whispering sweet nothings into the Beats By Dre headphones of chicks who work at places like King of Diamonds in Miami. It's clear he loves jiggle joints. And while we're not necessarily saying he shouldn't express that love on Devol, we do think he should limit it to a song or two. Anything more is overkill and not really what we want to be hearing Wayne do at this point in his career.

DEVOL 3

3. Steer clear of writing any "love songs" dedicated to Karrine "Superhead" Steffans. We all heard/loved "Prostitute." It was funny, charismatic, and even a little charming. That was back when Wayne could have sneezed on a record and made it fly up the charts. It was also reportedly about Wayne's relationship with "Superhead," which only made it that much more interesting. All of that said, we're kinda over the whole Wayne/Superhead thing. So, even though Wayne has said he'll always have a thing for Miss Steffans, we hope there aren't any weird "love songs" dedicated to her on Devol. Plus, isn't there another lovely lady in your life now, Wayne?!

DEVOL 4

4. Try to avoid putting together a crappy YMCMB posse cut just for the sake of showing your label some "love." If Drake and Nicki or Nicki and Tyga or even Tyga and Lil Twist make sense on a track together, great. But, what we don't want to hear is Wayne on a track with every single member of YMCMB (including Fred Durst!) doing some sort of "crew love" song. Save that for the next YMCMB compilation that's inevitably going to get put on the 2012 release schedule once the G.O.O.D. Music album drops. Or, better yet, find the right mix of YMCMB members to get on one single posse cut on Devol that fits into the concept of the record. Otherwise, spare us of having to sit through a 10-minute track about…nothing.

DEVOL 5

5. Write an awesome song about your relationship with hip-hop and get someone like DJ Premier to produce it. Wouldn't this be something? Wayne's been in the game so long now that we want to hear him spit about his love/hate relationship with rapping. And, with his deep discography, we're sure someone like Premier could help him craft a well thought out song for hip-hop that'd sound great in the middle of Devol. Now, that is something we'd love.

In This Story: