Bringing You Up To Speed: Kid Cudi

Today Kid Cudi helps to change the direction of hip hop with his debut album, Man on the Moon: The End of Day.

This album’s importance comes from Kid Cudi being the first lyrically strong hip hop artist from, the now famous, XXL Magazine Freshman Class of ‘09 cover to drop a debut album.

Luckily for hip hop, Man on the Moon: The End of Day is shaping up to be one of the best musical works of ‘09.  Cudi blows away all expectations by creating a record about finding himself through personal expression.  This album has set the bar high for all the other emerging emcees such as Wale, B.o.B., J.Cole, and Mickey Factz, who have yet to drop their debut albums.  I hope these artists see Kid Cudi’s success as inspiration to create masterpieces of their own!

Kid Cudi put in a lot of hard work to get to this point, however, having moved from Cleveland to New York five years ago and slowly working his way into the hip hop spotlight.

To get a good feel for the Cleveland native’s rise to fame, we have to go back a year to when he linked up with 10.Deep to release his now classic A Kid Named Cudi mixtape.  Here is the trailer to the mixtape which offers good insight into Kid Cudi’s style and personality.

Without jokes or gimmicks, Kid Cudi set out to have people feel him in his music, and because of this, the mixtape enjoyed a great deal of success.  Eventually, Kanye West took notice of Kid Cudi and signed him to the G.O.O.D. Music family.

One of Cudi’s most successful tracks to date, “Day n Night” off of the 10.Deep mixtape enjoyed an incredible amount of success, both as the original version and the Crookers remix. Here is the original video for the Crookers remix, which was only released a few days ago. Word is that this video only cost $250 dollars to produce!

This dreamlike song easily fits into Kid Cudi’s debut album, and continues to be his most recognizable track to date.

His quick rise to fame, and the pressure to exceed everyone’s expectations soon caught up with the Cleveland rapper, who toyed with the idea of leaving the music industry entirely before his first album had hit the shelves.  It’s no secret that Kid Cudi has strong feelings about people critiquing his music!

Word is that Cudi wanted to retire because his personal life was suffering.  However, after making the announcement about quitting, his fans went crazy begging the rapper to stick with it and to ignore the haters.

The support from his fans changed Cudi’s mind, and inspired him to take the stage at 2009’s SXSW event to perform and announce that his retirement would no longer take place because hip hop was bigger than him!

Here is the video of that performance and statement.

Kid Cudi left SXSW determined to work on crafting his debut album into something the fans would love and, by doing so, brought us into his world with the record!

The whole album flows really well, especially with Common narrating between the different acts.  This is often not the case with successful mainstream hip hop albums where hit singles are forcefully placed on the album, disrupting its feel.

Every song on Man on the Moon: The End of Day falls into a personal theme of family, emotions, and Cudi’s rise to success.

Because of his undeniable talent and the value he brings to the world of hip hop, he was featured on the track “Already Home” off of Jay-z’s Blueprint 3.  Here is a video of Jay-z and Kid Cudi performing the track live in front of a sold out Madison Square Garden crowd.

Performing with Jay-z is quite an accomplishment, but Kid Cudi had an even better moment that same day, when he performed his third single off of Man on the Moon: The End of Day, “Pursuit of Happiness,” on The David Letterman Show.

This is one of the best live hip hop performances I have seen, and should be considered for the official music video for the single!

Kid Cudi is venting in this track, which was produced by Ratatat and features vocals by MGMT, showing us that following your dreams, no matter what other people think, is the only way to become truly happy.

“Living my life getting our dreams,
People told me slow my roll,
I’m screaming out fuck that,
Imma do just what I want,
Lookin’ ahead, no turnin back,
If I fall, if I die,
Know I lived it to the fullest,
If I fall, If I die,
Know I lived and missed some bullets.”

Those lines sum up the feel and inspiration behind Cudi’s album.

Cudi, who takes us with him on his search for self in his music, is also venturing into acting.  He has stated that acting is his first love, and is entertaining the idea of being in films as well as a comedy series.

Kid Cudi is going to be a major force in hip hop for years to come.