Big Sean - Dark Sky Paradise

[Music Head]

enters the Billboard chart this week at #1

Spotify online listen
not yet rated by allmusic

3rd album
7 featured artists
all my favs, Kanye, Drake, Chris Brown, Lil Wayne
not my thing but it may be yours

artist website - http://uknowbigsean.com/splash/

Bio - from allmusic



Born in California but raised in Detroit, rapper Big Sean made big news in 2007 when he signed with Kanye West's then-recently formed label GOOD Music. Sean had
met West through a hip-hop radio station in Detroit. He was just trying to impress the superstar by displaying his freestyle skills, but after Sean's in-studio performance,
West offered him a recording contract and helped set up his debut mixtape, Finally Famous, Vol. 1, released in 2007. A second volume arrived in 2009 with a third
following in 2010.

In 2011, Sean issued his official debut, Finally Famous, featuring the single "My Last" with special guest Chris Brown. The album debuted at number three on the main
U.S. charts, and later that year, the single "Dance (A$$)," featuring Nicki Minaj, became his first in the pop Top Ten. Hall of Fame followed in 2013, also on GOOD Music,
with Lil Wayne, Minaj, Nas, and Miguel on the guest list; it too reached number three on the pop chart. Dark Sky Paradise, released in early 2015, featured a similarly
impressive guest list, including repeats in Kanye West, John Legend, and Lil Wayne, plus Drake, Ariana Grande, and E-40. It also featured the chart-topping single "I
Don't Mess with You."

Album Review - from pitchfork



Dark Sky Paradise, his newest, does not wholly shed his aspirations for a certain level of legitimacy, as the nonsensical but very official-sounding title would implicate.
But it is by many lengths his best album, and the first one that gets closest to hitting an elusive sweet spot where his music works as mindless fun while still leaving you
just enough to chew on. The best example of this is "I Don’t **** With You", the song that kick-started the album and perhaps saved Sean’s career as we know it. Put
online in September along with three other tracks, the song is an obvious banger with an instantly catchy hook and some truly great lines—"I just bought a crib, three
stories, that bitch a trilogy"—that also leverages his broken engagement with "Glee"’s Naya Rivera in a way that feels authentically inspired. That song is where
everything clicks for Big Sean, and the confidence he seems to derive from fully harnessing his powers seeps from its pores.

Not all of Dark Sky Paradise is as successful, but when it’s at its best it feels like it came from the same place: a guy rapping more ferociously than he ever has because
he knows that he’s better than he ever was. It’s that quantifiable oomph in Sean’s rapping that makes Dark Sky Paradise feel immediately more substantial than
anything he’s released. Lyrically, he still straddles a line between being knowingly bald-faced and straight up showing his ass too often—"Headed to the game for OK
seats/ Now I’m courtside at OKC"—but there’s palpable kinetic energy in the way he raps now, spitting in an almost-literal sense, his words splattering across beats in
places that he may not even have intended.

There’s a controlled but energizing chaos to songs like "Dark Sky (Skyscrapers)", the standout Kanye feature "All Your Fault", and especially "Paradise", which was
uploaded to SoundCloud alongside "I Don't **** With You" but appears here with a new, and fantastic, second verse. On these songs, Sean’s eagerness imbues his
music with a sense of urgency that makes his typically dopey lyrics—"I was in Florida, no Marlins, nigga/ I’m that Shawn, no Marlon, nigga"—feel not just like rib-nudging
cracks but legitimate boasts.

Unfortunately, the album only sustains that energy for about half its run time. After "Paradise"—which is preceded by the admirably boogying R&B palate cleanser "Play
No Games"—Dark Sky Paradise becomes dreary and ponderous much like his second album, with leaden beats running past the five minute mark for no apparent
reason. The album picks back up with its closing two tracks—the slightly treacly but skillfully executed "One Man Can Change the World" and the DJ Dahi-produced
"Outro", which chops up a soul song (Darondo’s "Didn’t I") about as well as Kanye ever did—but it’s hard not to feel like the album’s second side represents a major
missed opportunity.

The deluxe bonus tracks—most notably the Ariana Grande collaboration "Research", which has a beguilingly tricky beat—help redeem the proceedings, and if you’re
the type of person who doesn’t mind actively perfecting tracklists, you can make a pretty solid little rap album by replacing the album’s soft midsection with those three
songs. Regardless, Dark Sky Paradise is a big leap in the direction of the ideal Big Sean full-length. Whether he will ever make it there is certainly an open question, but
in the meantime the smirkiest rapper in the business finally has an album that justifies all that self-satisfaction.

sorry, it's all like this:

[video=youtube;ui1JiOZ1zp4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ui1JiOZ1zp4[/video]

Track Listing

1. Dark Sky (Skyscrapers)
2. Blessings
3. All Your Fault
4. I Don't **** With You
5. Play No Games
6. Paradise
7. Win Some, Lose Some
8. Stay Down
9. I Know
10. Deep
11. One Man Can Change the World
12. Outro

[CRAZY-HORSE]

McCartneys next album will probably be full of feature artists...im dreading it!

[jazzboCR]

McCartneys next album will probably be full of feature artists...im dreading it!

Easy enough to ignore an aging star's desperate search for continued relevance, I'd think. See the "Road Warriors" Thread for those still struggling to make it and leave the tired past and dubious future aside.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

Why do artists need to be relevant,or more to the point,feel as though they need to be relevant with distinguished careers and the 'history' of who and what they are attached to their names????
I could name dozens of major artists who have not been 'relevant' in the last thirty years but still do what they do well for they most part...
Because I originally mentioned McCartney whom iv been a huge fan of since I was a kid discovering music I'll stick with him...
Does he really feel his last two singles,one with Kanye,the other with Kanye and Rihanna actually sold mega quantities because he was part of them...he'd be a fool to think that IMO.
Does he think working with Ronson on his latest album actually make him relevant and 'brand new' again,I don't think so...
And he's not the only one, they should all just get to the point where they say enough is enough its time to bow out gracefully before they embarrass themselves and become parodies of themselves.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

On to another of my favourites now in Neil Young...
If he only released half the material he has over the last thirty years his back catalogue would be as impressive as anyone's in the game...
Instead,he goes off on half-baked,half-cocked muses and he amost always disappoints his fans...
And if most of that stuff was really good enough why doesn't he perform it live???
He has released something like six albums in the last five years,he could have made one maybe two very good albums instead of six mediocre sets....

[jazzboCR]

Bro C-H--Can I agree with you more than 100%? Because I will do so. If an artist has no more to say or hasn't the ability to say stuff, what is it about their egos that won't let them go to emeritus status? Or hands-on consultancy? It's a bit easier on the jazz side--Toots Thielmans and Clark Terry played effectively into their late 80's but neither had the daily grind or writing/performing pressure either. "The same thing that takes you up can take you down." Dunno who said that but it's true.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

I totally agree with you also...
The jazz and blues guys produce quality material well into their 70s and beyond...
And I really don't think they have the same pressures heaped on them by their side of the industry as the mainstream pop artists do...
Jazz and blues,IMO,is more about quality not quantity...
I sure hope Gaga gets some leeway now...
Her first album 'the fame/fame monster' was brilliant pop.
The second one 'born this way' was average and the third,I cannot recall the title, was abysmal IMO....
I really hope she makes some quality jazz albums now because that is her 'destiny' IMO.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

Damn, we haven't even discussed Big Sean's album yet....and why would we?.....lol