Dwanye ‘Lil Wayne’ Carter once said that his funniest joke is that he’s broke.

After Wayne’s newest album “The Carter III” became the fastest selling album of the year this June, it seems like he won’t be laughing anytime soon.

Lil Wayne’ has taken the industry, along with teenaged kids in polo shirts by storm the past few years by virtually having eight bars on every song on the radio. His street-approved mixtape series like “Da Drought” and “Dedication” have kept the Atlanta-based M.C. relevant in the rapidly changing environment of mainstream hip-hop. For years, due to leaked material, fans waited for the continuously delayed “The Carter III” to finally arrive. Backed by the huge singles of “Lollipop” and “A Milli,” Wayne went from the youngest member of the Cash Money army to the top of the world.

But is “The Carter III” all really it’s cracked up to be? Yes and no.

As a whole, the album suffers from being over-produced. Wayne’s newfound super stardom has allowed him to collaborate with a whole new range or artists and producers, but that’s not necessarily a good thing. His third collaboration with Robin Thicke, “Tie My Hands,” is awkward and melodramatic. D. Smith’s “The Cure”-esque vocals on “Hold Me Down” are totally mismatched for verses about coke and birds.

However, “The Carter III” does succeed, namely when Wayne is murdered over his own tracks.
The undeniable pinnacle of the album is the verses Fabolous and Juelz Santana spit on “You Ain’t Got Nothing.” The Alchemist produced track is one of the most well-polished anthems to come out in years, with Fabolous exploding on references to Kermit the Frog, and the ironic comparisons of his guns to The Wayans Brothers.

Something similar happens to Wayne when Jay-Z eliminates any torch passing that was to occur on “Mr. Carter,” while he overshadows Wayne again, as he did on “Hello Brooklyn 2.0.”

The trend doesn’t end there as on “Mrs. Officer,” “La La,” and “Comfortable,” Wayne is blown away from verses by Bobby Valentino, Busta Ryhmes and Babyface respectively.

So what does this say about Lil’ Wayne? Can people only stomach his obnoxiousness for his usual few bars, or is he, as he likes to call himself, the best rapper alive?

It’s premature to make such snap judgments, but if Wayne continues his immortalization in the hip-hop community, along with mainstream music, ala Kanye West and Jay-Z, he just may be considered to be the best rapper alive.

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