Chris Brown feat. Drake, T.I., Fabolous, Kanye West, and Andre 3000- “Deuces (Remix)”
From mixtapes

I haven’t done a Rap State of the Union think-piece in a while; now that this song is gaining some radio traction though, it might be time to go back to the well. The bad news is that 75% of “Deuces (Remix)” is garbage. The good news is that any of these rappers is still better than Tyga on the original.

Because Drake can only rap in that one deliberate, monotonous, faux-spoken word flow (which I love), the beat changes for his lead-off verse, and the changed beat sounds eerily similar to Phil Collins’ “Against All Odds.” His verse has some okay moments, and the highlight is “Every time I try to break it off / We just yell until we’re tired and I break you off.”

T.I. then sets his dial to “nimble” and delivers an economical verse that is effective without saying much at all. Kanye makes it a point to curse a lot, and he apparently stole Drake’s composition book labeled “Hackneyed Puns” when they were in the studio didn’t meet and phoned in these verses from different parts of the country. Fabo then rhymes “shit” with “bitch” six times. I do, however, love: “Act like there’s gum in your hair, girl / Cut it ouuuuuut.” So true, Fab. Peanut butter works as well.

And that brings us to Andre 3000. They saved him for last, and there were about two minutes left in the song; so I was expecting him to black out like he did on the remixes for “Walk It Out” and “Throw Some D’s.” He decided to take a deuce on “Deuces” instead. He exaggerates the enjambment that made him unique until it becomes annoying. He sounds so detached that it comes off as a stunt. Quick: Rhyme five words with “door.” Yep. That’s what he did too. Andre 3000 has become a parody of himself, which, in a roundabout way, brings us to my central question:

Is Andre 3000 hip-hop’s Marlon Brando?

1. They both revolutionized a tired genre of their respective arts. As part of Outkast, Dre reinvigorated hip-hop by introducing the slow, soulful, idiosyncratic Dirty South to the mainstream. Similarly, Brando changed film acting forever with the Stanislavski Method that he learned from Stella Adler. The influence of each man within his craft is immeasurable: Andre 3000 is as much of a “rapper’s rapper” as Brando is an “actor’s actor.”

2. Both did their best work when inspired by a collaborator early in their careers. Dre, of course, worked as the yang to Big Boi’s yin on Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, ATLiens, Aquemini, and Stankonia. Brando was pushed by director Elia Kazan on the stage and film versions of A Streetcar Named Desire, Viva Zapata!, and On the Waterfront. Each person knew his role in the arrangement and experienced a creative peak over a small period of time.

3. After these creative partnerships dissolved, both men were left to their own eccentric devices. Three Stacks lost his passion for rap and focused on acting, painting, and playing guitar. Brando’s behavior became more erratic, and he worked as an activist. Just as Dre disobeyed unspoken rules in rap by being a vegetarian and wearing outlandish costumes, Brando publicly argued about money with studios and engaged in many public outbursts. Both had toxic relationships with women as well.

4. Both experienced a mid-career renaissance that somehow validated all of their eccentricities. For Brando, it was his Academy Award-winning performance in The Godfather. Although he was just as crazy in his contract-haggling and insistence on not reading the script, he somehow channeled all of his awkward quirks into one of the most iconic performances in all of cinema. For Andre 3000, “Hey Ya” rewarded his dalliance with guitar and traditional pop melodies, and it became one of the only true classics of the ’00s.

5. So far, Dre has handled his post-“Hey Ya” period with some grace. “International Playaz Anthem” is his Apocalypse Now. But you can start to listen to these songs in the same way that you can trace Brando’s weight gain across the late ’70s. I’m wondering what 3000’s Superman II is going to be—since Idlewild was Superman I—and, even worse, what his Island of Dr. Moreau might be. Brando took the inventive use of props, sense memory, Method preparation, and naturalistic delivery and became a fat, unprepared mess. Andre has taken a stream-of-consciousness, caesura-inflected, easygoing cadence and blown it into artifice. I’m watching him very closely.

It goes without saying that Erykah Badu is Sasheen Littlefeather in this conceit.