MY NAME IS MY NAME
Pusha T
2013

Of every rap album, this might be the one where the highest number of full verses wander back into my brain. Ten years removed from Clipse (whose “Grindin’” I maintain is the best song of the 00s,) Pusha T reclaims all-time status with My Name Is My Name, his debut album after a number of mixtapes exploring his identity and sound as a solo artist. Unlike many of the rap albums of the last fifteen years, the track list is sparse, with twelve radio length songs and zero bonus tracks or skits.

The musical variety on this album within that short runtime is impressive. There are aggressive songs that only make sense in the context of the house inspired album rap of Death Grips and Danny Brown. There are ballads that serve as alternatives to Drake’s sad rap – there are gritty, trap beat songs ready for NBA championship ads. Pusha unifies it all, from the movie references, the coke jokes, the stoic exhaustion of a man who’s been doing all this a little too long. He’s elevated to another level as a rapper, with the complexity of his flows and the energy of his vocal delivery reaching new highs. 

The list of collaborators is top of the industry then and now, including Future, Pharrell, Jeezy, 2 Chainz, Rick Ross, and Kelly Rowland. In a top 5 all time Kendrick guest appearance, “Nosetalgia” has a second verse that shatters the at-bats by everyone else. By the time the “taco meat laying on his gold” delivery arrives, I’m back in my little rap dork driver’s seat, hitting every line like I’m doing it at karaoke. The obvious bum note is Chris Brown singing the hook of “Sweet Serenade,” a choice I’d already feel shitty about given his history of abuse, but the hook also doesn’t sound especially good. You aren’t listening to My Name Is My Name for its kind heart – this is coke rap with violence at its outskirts (and sometimes center stage.) 

At some point, maybe I’ll feel like writing about Kanye West again. His work meant an incalculable amount to me for many years – his disintegration was probably less into being an offensive reactionary and more into being a very boring one. The closest I’ll come this year is his executive production on this album – while every song he’s credited for producing has an essential collaborator, it’s hard to deny the aesthetic overlap with his album Yeezus earlier that year. At the time, when I was hooked on the guy, I loved this album all the more for its part in that myth.

In my memory, this album retreats into the “yeah, it was cool when it came out, but how great is it really?” zone only maintained by cowards. The moment I hear the opening shrieks of that Hudson Mohawke sample and the insane beat on “King Push,” I’m all in forever. “CB4 when you rhyme, Simple Simon.”

KEY TRACKS: “King Push,” “Numbers on the Board,” “Nosetalgia”
CATALOG CHOICE: King Push – Darkest Before Dawn: The Prelude
NEXT STOP: Wolf, Tyler the Creator
AFTER THAT: Shook, Algiers