Souljaboytellem.com

iTunes Review

Atlanta MC Soulja Boy is all of 16 years old, and though many rappers his age have gained recognition for their lyrical precocity, (Chi Ali and early Juvenile spring to mind), or for their powerful family connections (Lil Bow Wow, Lil Romeo) Soulja Boy has been getting play on radio stations and curbside stereos all over the country for simply acting like a sixteen year old boy. Lewd jokes, incomprehensible slang, and frenzied exhortations to dance are his stock in trade. He is a rapper who is not concerned with rapping, with beats, or with lyrical witticisms; he’s exclusively interested in getting his audience dancing. Predictably, the lightning bolt quick success of Soulja Boy’s infectious “Crank Dat Soulja Boy” has drawn howls of outrage from gray hairs among Hip-Hop’s establishment, who claim that Soulja Boy is polluting their art form with simplistic schoolyard rhymes. But Soulja Boy is simply tapping into an ageless tradition of American Popular Music, the pop song as a catalyst for a dance sensation. “Crank Dat” fits somewhere between Bo Diddley’s “Crawdaddy”, Fats Domino’s “Twist” and Malcolm McClaren’s “Duckwalk” on the scale of nonsensical yet euphoric dance tunes. Of course Soulja Boy’s shtick can get wearying over the course of a full length, but ultimately, souljaboytellem.com gets by on the strength of its fun loving spirit and youthful vitality.