Kanye, 50 set to do battle

For starters, I just started playing a leaked version of Graduation by Kanye West. I'll tell you what I think when I blast through the whole thing, but you should know that "Stronger" has been getting frequent play on my iPod for the last week or so. Both this album and 50 Cent's Curtis are slated for a Sept. 11th release, creating much fanfare and rivalry in the hip-hop world. In a very shady coincidence, both albums also leaked within hours of each other early last week. Fiddy has claimed that he will retire if Kanye sells more albums, a bet I sincerely wish we got in writing. Rolling Stone had the two appear as their cover story, and while the pieces are well worth the read, I was kind of disappointed to find out that the West/50 rivalry isn't nearly as heated as everyone would like to believe. I kind of enjoyed the image of Kanye holding his hands up in victory as he stands on a crying 50 Cent's body curled up in the fetal position. Maybe he's handing 50 a gold watch to help commemorate his retirement too. I dunno.

Last night my roommate handed me a mix of Okkervil River's stuff. I had heard of them insofar that their the new indie band du jour, but don't know much of their stuff. I'm gonna give it a shot a little later, see if maybe the indie kids got something right this time around.

Till then, I offer you a little taste of what I've been listening to in the last week or so:

Matchbox 20 - How Far We've Come
Kanye West - Stronger
Linkin Park - Shadow of the Day
Velvet Revolver - The Last Fight
Finger Eleven - Paralyzer
Pearl Jam - Daughter (Live at Lollapalooza 07) [The unedited version that caused a shitstorm last month]

That's pretty much it. Back later in the week, probably with more info on the radio show.

==TJ==