This summer, Lil Wayne told a radio station that rap had become "boring," and that he prefers to spend time on his skateboard. Yet on much of this mixtape, he sounds less bored than he has in years, drawling filthy, funny rhymes over beats borrowed from Rick Ross, 2 Chainz and more. He's not the dadaist magician of six years ago, when his rhymes mixed Afro-futurism, gangsta tough talk and whatever else struck his fancy; he's now content to reel off punch lines, mostly about oral sex. But he's still got a flow that's like no one else's. When roused by witty company (Nicki Minaj on "Mercy," J. Cole on "Green Ranger"), he sounds like the greatest rapper ever to dream of competing in the X Games.

Listen to 'Dedication 4':

“The Pretender”

This song wasn't part of the planned track listing for 2007's Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, and was put together in a day. "It happened after we recorded a lot of stuff," said Dave Grohl. Yet it ended up as the album opener and the lead single. Grohl called it "a stomping Foo Fighters uptempo song with a little bit of Chuck Berry in it." The singer hinted at the lyrics' political overtones: "Everyone's been f---ed over before and I think a lot of people feel f---ed over right now and they're not getting what they were promised."