Tha Carter III

Tha Carter III is the sixth studio album by American rapper Lil Wayne, released on June 10, 2008, by Cash Money, Universal Motown & Young Money Entertainment. It follows a string of mixtape releases and guest appearances on other hip hop and R&B artists' albums. The album features appearances from Jay Z, T Pain, Fabolous, Robin Thicke, Busta Rhymes, Juelz Santana, Babyface, Bobby V, and Kanye West, among others. It also features Static Major, who is credited posthumously following his death in February of that year. Amid release delays and leaks, Tha Carter III became one of the most anticipated releases of 2008. It debuted at number one on the US Billboard 200, selling over one million copies in its first week—which made it one of the fastest selling albums in the US. It reached sales of 2.88 million copies by the end of 2008 and produced four commercially successful singles on the Billboard Hot 100—"Lollipop," which peaked at number one, and the top ten singles "A Milli" and "Got Money", as well as the top 20 single "Mrs. Officer". Upon its release, Tha Carter III received widespread acclaim from music critics and has since been regarded as one of Wayne's best albums. It earned the rapper several accolades, including a spot on Rolling Stones list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. It was nominated for Album of the Year at the 2009 Grammy Awards and won for Best Rap Album, while "Lollipop" won Best Rap Song and "A Milli" won Best Rap Solo Performance. It has been certified octuple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

Lil Wayne stated that producers would include The Alchemist, Cool & Dre, Deezle, Jim Jonsin, Just Blaze, Kanye West, Mannie Fresh, The Runners, Timbaland, Danja, and will. i. am. In an interview with HipHopCanada. com, Solitair of the Black Jays stated that he and Cipha Sounds produced a track called "Outstanding", which later eventually leaked. The Runners have stated that they have produced three tracks for Tha Carter III. Lil Wayne revealed that he has a track for Eminem, which he has yet to send to him. He described this song as the "craziest". The album features guest appearances by Fabolous, T Pain, Brisco, Bobby V, Babyface, Betty Wright, Static Major, Robin Thicke, Jay Z, Juelz Santana, and Busta Rhymes. MTV reported that Wyclef Jean worked on a couple of tracks for the album and that a song featuring Justin Timberlake, Nelly Furtado, and Timbaland was likely to appear on the album. However, that Timbaland produced track did not make the final cut. David Banner confirmed that he will be credited for five tracks on the final cut of Tha Carter III, but only one is featured on the album. After the copyright controversy of "Playing with Fire", the track was later removed and replaced with another David Banner produced track "Pussy Monster". Swizz Beatz stated he was also working on the album. When asked about how many tracks Kanye West had contributed, he answered:

On the first visit he had five joints, on the second visit he gave me a CD with fifteen joints on it. I then told him to slow down and he left me alone, but we got a good three on the album. He confirmed that he had a few tracks on The Leak that are produced by Kanye West.

Tha Carter IIIs lead single, "Lollipop", peaked at number one on the US Billboard Hot 100, staying at the top for three weeks. It was Wayne's most successful solo single in his career, winning one Grammy Award, a BET Award, and an MTV VMA. The song was praised as an "electro bumpin' infectious track", The song garnered countless freestyles and remixes, while Wayne's original version was praised with "spectacular rhyme". When questioned about the unplanned leak, Lil Wayne said:

We have to find out exactly what's out there. I'll probably just [collect] all the songs that's floating around and make my own mixtape called The Leak since people want the music so bad. To tell you the truth though, there's a song I did with Kanye West out there—of course you want to save that for your album, but the rest of them songs probably wouldn't have made the album. There's a song floating around that says 'produced by Timbaland'. On May 24, 2008, 10 second snippets of multiple songs were leaked onto AT&T Media Mall. On May 30–31, Tha Carter III was leaked internationally. The first of the leaks were distributed on May 30 at around 8pm where five songs from the track list were available on the internet. Hours later on May 31 at 12am 1am the whole album was leaked and posted on various websites for free download. The DJ responsible for the leaks was DJ Chuck T who retaliated for an interview conducted by Wayne, where he discredited all DJs and the mixtape scene days before. Lil Wayne later called DJ Drama's radio show Shade 45 Sirius Satellite Radio to explain that his comments were meant specifically for DJ Empire who leaked his materials periodically without his permission, consent, or knowledge; he also apologized for any misunderstandings between him and the numerous DJs that have aided him in the mixtape industry. He made it clear, however, that he wished for any feelings of dislike or resentment to remain.

The album's lead single, "Lollipop", topped the US Billboard Hot 100 for 5 non consecutive weeks, making it Wayne's most successful single in his career. It features rapper Static Major. The album's second single, "A Milli", was another top ten. It reached No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also won a Grammy for Best Rap Song. The video for the second single, "A Milli", was set to be released in May, and has since been mainstreamed. Multiple versions of the track were to be included on the album as "skit like" tracks, featuring artists such as Tyga, Cory Gunz, Hurricane Chris and Lil Mama. Another artist, 13 year old Lil Chuckee, was also set to appear on one of the "A Milli" skits. None of the skits made the final cut of the album. The third single is "Got Money", featuring T Pain. It reached No. 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. The fourth single is "Mrs. Officer", featuring Bobby Valentino. It made the Top 20 in just four weeks. "Comfortable" was sent to American rhythmic contemporary radio as the album's fifth and final single on September 29, 2008. "Lollipop", "A Milli", "Got Money", and another track, "Mr. Carter", were nominated for a Grammy. Lil Wayne also performed "Tie My Hands" with Robin Thicke at the 51st Grammy Awards. The album also featured the releases of promo singles. "3 Peat" peaked at number 66 on the Billboard 100. "You Ain't Got Nuthin" featuring Fabolous and Juelz Santana was released as a promo single, peaking at number 81 on the Billboard 100. "Mr. Carter", featuring Jay Z, peaked at number 62 on the Billboard 100, number 27 on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart, and number 13 on the Top Rap Songs. It was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or a Group in 2009.

On July 24, 2008, Abkco Music Inc. filed a lawsuit against Lil Wayne for copyright infringement and unfair competition, specifically referring to the track "Playing with Fire". In the lawsuit, Abkco claims that the song was obviously derived from The Rolling Stones' "Play with Fire", to which Abkco owns the rights. Subsequently, "Playing with Fire" was removed from the track list of Tha Carter III on all online music stores and replaced with the David Banner produced track, "Pussy Monster". In March 2011, producer Deezle (Darius Harrison) sued Wayne and his parent labels Cash Money Records over unpaid royalties from Tha Carter III album. In May 2011, producer Bangladesh also filed a lawsuit against Weezy & Co. over unpaid royalties. In early June 2011, another producer named David Kirkwood filed a lawsuit against Young Money Entertainment and Cash Money Records on claims that the labels have failed to pay him over $1.5 million in royalties and production services for his work on the album, also including his songwriting on "Love Me or Hate Me", a bonus song featured only on the deluxe edition of the album. Also in June 2011, Dallas producers Play N Skillz filed a lawsuit against him claiming Wayne owed them at least $1 million in unpaid royalties for "Got Money" from Tha Carter III.

Tha Carter III received widespread acclaim from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 84, based on 26 reviews. Pitchforks Ryan Dombal stated, "he distills the myriad metaphors, convulsing flows, and vein splitting emotions into a commercially gratifying package". Nathan Rabin of The A. V. Club called Lil Wayne "the man of the moment, but the disc's best moments strive for timelessness and attain it." Tom Breihan of The Village Voice described it as "a sprawling mess, and it clangs nearly as often as it clicks" and "a work of staggering heights and maddening inconsistencies", but commended Wayne for his unconventional performance, stating "On paper, this is a textbook focus grouped major label hodgepodge, replete with girl songs and club songs and street songs. But every facet of the album comes animated and atomized by Wayne's absurdist drug gobbling persona". Drew Hinshaw of PopMatters stated "Tha Carter III is a monumental album full of powerful, self defeating statements that obliterate rap's internal logic without offering too much more than indifferent bong logic in return. Judged, however, as a collection of singles and quotable verses—the criteria on which we've been grading hip hop records since the end of disco—Tha Carter III is an agonizing piece of work". Jeff Weiss of the Los Angeles Times found it "scattershot", stating "When Wayne's mad alchemy works, Tha Carter III evinces shades of brilliance that merit the wild hype, but in its transparent attempts to define its era, it fails, falling victim to the imperial bloat of its big budget mishmash of styles." Brandon Perkins of URB commented that "As a sum of its parts, Tha Carter III does not transcend, but a good number of those parts are otherworldly enough." Julian Benbow of The Boston Globe said the album was "not an instant classic, but it is the best rap album since Kanye West dropped "Graduation" last year." Eric R. Danton of the Hartford Courant said of Lil Wayne, "If his raspy, cartoonish voice didn't mark him as different, his quick wit, offhanded wordplay and quirky subject matter should have in a genre populated largely by grim faced imitators." Other reviews are average or mixed: Chase Hoffberger of The Austin Chronicle gave the album three stars out of five and said, "It's Wayne's personality that both floats and sinks TCIII." Kilian Murphy of Hot Press also gave it a score of three out of five and stated, "Gifted MC loses the run of himself without Mannie Fresh." Lewis P. of Sputnikmusic likewise gave it a score of three out of five and said the album "is scattershot, which oddly strengthens its faults, as if any lull in quality means that the next batch of producers can just reset the formula." (However, nearly three years later, in 2011, Alex Robertson of the same website gave the album a score of four and a half out of five and said it was "sort of a miracle: it's way too weird and confusing to be on the mainstream rap charts to be that record that everyone knows about but it is anyway. This album was in opposition to much of modern rap but somehow became popular and then proceeded to completely consume the genre and change its direction. [ ] Tha Carter III is a contradictory, against all odds masterpiece, and Lil Wayne may never perfect this balance again. I sincerely question: will anyone?") Ajitpaul Manjat of Tiny Mix Tapes gave the album two and a half stars out of five and stated that, "equipped with the stylish, but too often substance less Tha Carter III, Lil Wayne seems poised to flip the script on the "rapper racists" (radio stations, MTV) by evolving into the "biggest" rapper alive."

Tha Carter III was ranked number one in Blenders list of the 33 best albums of 2008. Christgau ranked its deluxe edition as the second best album of 2008. The album was also ranked number three on Rolling Stones list of the top 50 albums of 2008. It was nominated for a Grammy Award for Album of the Year, and it won for Best Rap Album at the 2009 Grammy Awards, while "Lollipop" won for Best Rap Song and "A Milli" won for Best Rap Solo Performance. Billboard magazine ranked the album number 103 on its list of the Top 200 Albums of the Decade. In 2012, the album was ranked number 437 on Rolling Stones list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, upgrading to number 208 in 2020 revised list. In 2012 Complex named the album one of the classic albums of the last decade.

With opening day sales figures of approximately 423,000 copies, Tha Carter III debuted at number one on the US Billboard 200 chart, selling 1,005,545 copies in its first week. This became Wayne's first US number one debut and his sixth top ten album. In its second week, the album dropped to number two on the chart, behind Coldplay's Viva La Vida or Death And All His Friends, selling an additional 309,000 copies. By the end of 2008, Tha Carter III had sold approximately 2.88 million copies and it was named the best selling album of the year in the United States by Billboard. On September 25, 2020, the album was certified six times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), for combined sales and album equivalent units of over six million units in the United States. "A Milli" contains a sample from "I Left My Wallet In El Segundo (Vampire Mix)", as performed by A Tribe Called Quest. "Comfortable" contains an uncredited sample from "You Don't Know My Name", written by Alicia Keys, Kanye West, and Harold Lilly, and performed by Keys. "Dr. Carter" contains samples from "Holy Thursday", written by David A. Axelrod. "DontGetIt" contains samples from "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood", written by Bennie Benjamin, Gloria Caldwell and Sol Marcus. "Action" contains a sample of "I'm So Hood" by DJ Khaled. "I'm Me" contains samples of "Go D. J. ", "Fireman", "Hustler Musik", and "Cash Money Millionaires" by Lil Wayne, "God Moving Over the Face of the Waters" by Moby, and "Rubberband Man" by T. I. "Gossip" contains a sample of "Stop in the Name of Love" by Margie Joseph. "Kush" contains a sample of "Honey Wild" by Con Funk Shun.