David Banner Complains About Rolling Stone Review of His "Masterpiece"

David Banner doesn't mince words when talking about his new album The Greatest Story Ever Told, which comes out today. "It's a masterpiece, dude," the Mississippi MC told Rolling Stone a few weeks ago. "It's one of the best rap albums in the last three or four years." But Banner wasn't pleased with our review of the album, which praised the rapper's political "bulldozer flow," but complained that he too-often traded in rote rhymes about guns and clubs. "The reviewer only wrote on songs like 'Shawty Say' and 'Get Like Me,' " Banner wrote in an e-mail to RS yesterday. "But those are just the Playboy covers to the Bible inside." Now, that's a good line!

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Song Stories

“Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Nirvana | 1991

"Smells Like Teen Spirit," named after a brand of deodorant marketed to girls, was Kurt Cobain's attempt to "write the ultimate pop song," he said, using the soft-loud dynamic of his favorite band, the Pixies. Cobain "had that dichotomy of punk rage and alienation," the song’s producer, Butch Vig, told Rolling Stone, "but also this vulnerable pop sensibility. In 'Teen Spirit,' a lot of that vulnerability is in the tone of his voice." Sadly, by the time of Nirvana's last U.S. tour, in late '93, Cobain was tortured by the obligation to play "Teen Spirit" every night. "There are many other songs that I have written that are as good, if not better," he claimed.

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