Michel'le was a bad example - I don't even know how or why that came to mind.
But bottom line is the new material he's planning on releasing that I've heard so far sounds out of it's time, and especially the topics and things he talks about, especially during his verse in "crack a bottle". It's so 90's, early 2000's. Look how Snoop evolved. Dre was evolving in sound a bit too with the 50 Cent material and a few other things, but now it seems like he's trying to take it back to the old west coast gang banging hip hop sound. As much as I love his beats and can agree with the Chronic album as being one of the best, I still hope we don't go back to that old school west coast sound. If we should go "backwards", then we should go for the late 90's early 2000's complicated style beats Timbaland sound.
I don't even want dance to go backwards. I'd rather take past elements and fuse them with today's style to create a whole new sound...even though I miss some of the older stuff. Imagine a world where a law was passed that we had to rewind and officially start over from 1994, playing nothing but hits from that time period and moving on from there. I don't know if I could keep my interest in dance if the entire euro-sound was forced to pop back and I had to sit through the 3-4 years it would take for the evolution, and then I would surely be finished once we reached the death of dance music. Also, that was also a time when I wasn't too interested in hip hop yet.
There was a time I used to want to go back to the older sound, but now I just want to ride along and see the evolution process WITHOUT the death of certain genres. I like "crack a bottle", but there's just something about it that makes it feel so "behind its time", and the next Dr Dre single that's supposedly coming sounds even more past its time and a bit "too hard" for today. I heard it on future flavaz, AND on an underground hip hop show. I'd even like more 2000's 50 Cent beat styled stuff and more current topics to rap about other than the streets of la, the gangs, and lowridin and trying to talk as if it's still the same as when they were kids in the past, today.
As far as "just lose it", I never really liked that song too much. The beat did stand out, especially for the time it was released, but still... Eminem did a lot to help make the song enjoyable, but overall the song seemed weak when it came to overall quality material. I don't think he could ever surpass the Chronic album, especially with the changes music has faced over time... but who knows, maybe within the next 10 years that possibility would change again, or he may evolve to come back and be on top of the pop game, just like Timbaland did with One Republic and Keri Hilson. By the way, what a perfect time it would've been to release Eminem's "without me" right now! He'd probably want to update and tweak or change a few lyrics and things about the song to fit today's standards, but other than that, it would probably still work today, despite the fact we're in a more serious, a bit emotional, laid back time of hip hop mixed with fun elements. Could Eminem return today with the crazy, creative, and clever way of arranging words and rhyming today and still make it the same way? I don't know, but it's already proven he can evolve with the dance style if he wanted, especially with Akon's "smack dat". I've seen each album from Eminem as a transition from the crazy Slim Shady to the grown up and calm "I'm still hard, but lets dance and have fun" Eminem. It would be hard to go back, unless something really controversial took place and there was a good evolution process for him to go back in that direction.
TI has been doing a great job. At first when he said he was the "king of the south", I thought he was transitioning into a comedian, but now, I'm not laughing any more. He is really doing his thing, doing it right, and doing it well, and kept going at it from day one until he eventually began topping the charts repeatedly.
"Live your life" and "dead and gone" are two songs I respect most from him.
