And just like that, someone saved hip hop. Yes I understand the drama of that statement and no, I do not use it lightly. Lupe Fiasco quite possibly may be the one to turn this sinking ship around.

To get things out of the way in this review, here is a list of things this album is not or does not contain:

• A predictably high ego-to-talent ratio. Unlike Kanye (who proportedly was supposed to save us in 2004) and countless others, Lupe’s lyrical prowess is not drowned by his own ego. This actually leaves room for music.
• Peppered club songs. It’s been a well established formula for selling over the past 10 years. Take 2-4 club tracks that require expensive producers, pepper it with an r’n’b jam and a bunch of crap filler and you’ve got a platinum hip hop album. Lupe doesn’t need no stinkin’ formulas.
• Cliched production. Another staple in modern hip hop is to have signature sounds by premier producers, resulting in the same stylistic crap being regurgitated over and over again. With this album, I had to look up who produced the songs because I pleasantly could not tell.

Good, now with that out of the way we can continue.

Food & Liquor could easily be the Illmatic of this decade. Gritty, real and honest, Lupe Fiasco’s lyrical talent takes center stage…but in no way is it overwhelming. Unlike Talib Kweli or Mos Def (who’s lyrical skills are awe-inspiring), you don’t get the sense that Lupe simply took his rhyme book and put a flashy beat over it. Instead, the rhyme and the beat fit seamlessly in almost every track, to produce what most modern hip hop albums today lack: heart.

When I think about the most defining albums in this genre (to me at least), each one stands out because they have a certain character, a feeling that you can almost touch when the disc spins to an end. Illmatic by Nas, 36 Chambers by Wu-Tang, Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys…they all have personality in their own right, personality that reflects the exact time and place in which they were created. Food & Liquor does the same.

A product of Chicago’s street scene, steeped in the fashion and partnered with the skate culture, the album exudes an overall realness that frankly is entirely absent from every other disc out there today. It straddles the line between underground truth and mainstream appeal, and it stands alone in the crowd for not giving airs of hopelessness and dread. Simply put, I don’t feel like I’ve just read the Book of Revelations after these 72 minutes.

I would be remiss if I didn’t point out key tracks, but it is hard as the album really is best digested as a whole. “Kick Push,” the popular single [video] takes quite possibly the sharpest left turn in the genre in recent memory. Guns and drug running are swept aside for smart word play about a life embracing skating. “The Instrumental,” possibly the strongest on the disc, is a rolling, haunting tale of a kid being a slave to television and the media. “Daydreamin’” is the closest thing to a Kanye soul track, but Jill Scott’s vocal performance maintains a freshness that keeps the it from sounding the slightest bit hackneyed. “Pressure,” which features a now-out-of-retirement Jay-Z is surprising. Musically, it borrows the piano/snare/guitar sound typical to many Hova tracks, but w/ a new twist. And the biggest surprise on this track is that Hova gets one verse. Lupe doesn’t give the supposed King of Hip Hop more space than that, nor does he lean on his credentials to legitimize the song.

Though I could spotlight almost any track on the disc, I will leave it at saying that the entire album has a pace and energy that any other artist in the game could only hope for. It’s smart. It’s entertaining. It’s thought provoking without being tiresome and sermonesque. I’m excited to listen to this again and again.

If the kid is only this good because he’s hungry, because it’s his first release, then I can’t even complain because he’s given such a great album. But if there’s even the slightest chance that he’ll get better from here…consider me tuned in. I’ll stick around the genre long enough to see it, because it’ll be worth it for damn sure.