This album has grown crazy amounts on me over the span of only 2 listens. I was originally UNBELIEVABLY intrigued by the concept because I love Jerry Seinfeld both as a comedian and from his phenomenal 90's classic show (Seinfeld co-written with Larry David), and of course I love hip hop music. However, I wouldn't go as far as to say I wasn't a fan of Wale, but I had never really given his music the amount of listening it required to fully determine whether I loved his music or not. I definitely loved some of his stand outs when I heard them, like "Nike Boots" but I just wasn't well knowledged on his library to know right from the first listen whether I fully endorsed this album or not. Upon giving it a couple rounds of airplane listens and long drive listens I have fully made my decision that I love this album.

Back to the concept, Wale and Jerry became friends after Wale's mixtape a few years ago called The Mixtape About Nothing and it included sound bites from Seinfeld similar to this album HOWEVER, this album actually is cosigned by the likes of Jerry Seinfeld's actual presence in new recordings on the album as well as sound bites from the show. The titling of the album is titled just as the show is, every track & show title beginning with "The _____" and the artwork is inspired/borrowed from the original Seinfeld artwork. If you're wondering who's feet those are alongside Wale's in the album cover, yes they are Jerry's.

Jerry has been up to some pretty cool stuff lately like his web show, Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee, collaborations with Miranda Sings, and even performing a brilliant new condensed set on a talk show, but this takes the cake, you can even watch some of the actual recordings of Jerry in the studio with Wale on Wale's Youtube:

Now to speak on the music itself, I came around so fast to the album in a big way due to the actual music of the album being good and not just the lyricism, a lot of hip hop albums get listened to only a few times by me 'cause if I'm not really digging the production of the music I don't feel I need to listen to it over and over. Also the story line of this album is great, not in the way that it tells a whole long linear story but in the way that you feel it is so well packaged and presented as is, when you finish it you feel no need to go back and listen to only specific tracks when you could just put the whole thing on again. I do need to keep listening more though because every time I really catch some of Wale's punchlines they are pretty dope, but I feel that sometimes I lose what he's saying due to the style of his execution as a rapper. However, I'm actually okay with it because it makes his style that much more original, besides-that's what we have rap genius for.

If you enjoy the cross collaboration of different types of artist that's been happening a lot in this generation as much as I do, I really hope you like this album as much as I did. Stuff like this is the way of the future.

No. 13 - Listen With Me: Wale "The Album About Nothing"