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He isn't really trying to break new ground on this relatively accessible collection of concise, melodic songs, but he is trying to add something to his influences instead of settling for a nostalgia trip.
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These songs are enjoyable and beautiful and pure hip-hop --- glittering, hard diamonds that hopefully won’t get buried in the underground scene’s mounds of coal.
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On 1988, Blueprint delivers a guide to a sparkplug of a year, capturing its essence whilst feeling bang up to date.
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Blueprint could have cut-and-pasted his way through 1988, recycling hooks, beats and samples, but he clearly took his time and laid out his vision.
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A true original not to the game, but to rap music at its best.
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For all his skillful sampling and solid lyrics, Blueprint hasn't broken any new ground with 1988, which just underscores the troubling tendency of underground art forms to become more like the mainstream as they age.
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UrbThe highlight of this album is Blueprint's pensive, jazzy landscape of strangled horns and muddy synths. [Jan/Feb 2005, p.94]
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Blueprint is the antidote to 12 months of Kanye overexposure. His gritty beats pour sand in West's glossy modernist Vaseline, and his rhymes have the anti-anti-intellectual attitude of a loudmouth braggart you'd be proud to have on your quiz bowl team.
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Though he's the kind of rhymer who scans "another good record with bad distribution" all too swimmingly, the hip-hop don't stop.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 9 out of 10
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Mixed: 0 out of 10
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Negative: 1 out of 10
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Apr 21, 2016
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ChrisAug 7, 2005A Tad above average. The only thing that is good is the dudes production.
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mattaJul 8, 2005This entire album is solid. Great beats and great production. Right up there with Lord Quas and Edan as the best rap albums of the year.