Happy 15th Anniversary to Common’s seventh studio album Finding Forever, originally released in the UK July 30, 2007 and in the US July 31, 2007.
For most of the ‘90s, Lonnie Rashid Lynn was known as Common Sense—until an indie ska band sued for the exclusive rights to the name. Rather than contend in court, he nicked it to Common. That’s on brand with the generally peace-loving stance of his conscious rap. It merged well with the Soulquarians collective, and they were instrumental in forging his seminal Like Water For Chocolate (2000).
In his 2012 autobiography, he says that breakthrough awoke his spirit as an artist, but its ambitious follow-up Electric Circus (2002) found Common chasing his muse into narrow corridors where few fans could follow. So he signed with Kanye West’s G.O.O.D. Music label to regroup. Kanye produced the course-correcting Be (2005). It captured something special, but there was room for improvement.
They went for a rebound on Finding Forever (2007). The two fall into lockstep hip-hop synchrony here, bringing the best of themselves while at peaks in their respective careers. And this is where Common’s discography gets interesting. Finding Forever is sonically similar to Be, but it’s tough to say which is definitively superior.
Things that I love about the album were the reasons other outlets savaged it. And a couple things I typically would hate, work really well for me. You could level almost any criticism at Finding Forever and someone’s write-up would agree with you. When the music is this polemic, you need to listen for yourself.
Before anything else, the disc pours out libation: a chakra-centering, Wonder-esque intro performed by Derrick Hodge (bass), Karriem Riggins (drums), James Poyser (keyboard), and Brandee Younger (harp). It sounds like its Gravillis Inc. cover art looks—curiously dark and undulating, but hopeful overall. Then with an epic opening of curtains, the boom-bap of “Start the Show” begins. Kanye handles the hook and lets Common flow over psychedelic, chopped shards of Dorothy Ashby’s “By the Time I Get to Phoenix.”
Kanye was a master of pulling disparate samples into combinations that shouldn’t succeed but do. It serves “The People” well. Here, Common addresses Be getting snubbed in four award categories, just as another artist’s worthy debut was shut out of its seven (“The people said that I was sharp / On TV at the GRAMMYs / Though they tried to India.Arie me / Got backstage, and I bumped into Stevie / He said no matter what, the people gon' see me”). Neo-soulster Dwele soothes the burn with his cooling incantation of a chorus, exactly what Common needs from his guests.
British pop songstress Lily Allen is not a typical guest, but as with every other patchwork creation on the disc though, she blends right into “Drivin’ Me Wild.” She likely helped it reach #56 in the UK. Meanwhile, Kanye’s snare-heavy, kick-light rhythms writhe and contort under a time-shifted rip of Rotary Connection’s “Love Has Fallen on Me.” These elements do their level best to hide the downbeat.
Conversely, “I Want You” is so predictably on-the-nose, I should resent it. Common’s cadence and hip-hop allusion are almost too perfect as he describes a breakup he can’t get over (“I take a deep breath when the times is hard / When I reminisce over you / My God”). Though it rocks like the Be single “Go,” its drums sourced from Detroit Emeralds’ “You're Getting a Little Too Smart” seem flagrant in their intent to conjure “The Light.”
That should be insulting. It really should. But damn if will.i.am didn’t produce an undeniable banger here. He even nailed the song’s catchy refrain and made me like it. When Bob James’ melted caramel “Feel Like Makin’ Love” drips over the last 16 bars, and flips to the Skull Snaps’ “It's a New Day” breakbeat, I wanna wild out and headbang until the track cuts off. Even though the construction is obvious and could feel pandering, everything served here tastes good. Why fight it when you can love it?
As producer of all but 3 cuts, Kanye leaves fingerprints all over Finding Forever. Still, nothing equals him stepping from the control room to the booth for the rock-soul raver “Southside.” These Chicago boys bring full megaphone rah-rah to their fist-pumping hometown tribute. The symbiosis is amazing. Like Phife and Q-Tip on “Electric Relaxation,” Kanye hits ‘em high, Common hits ‘em low.
Just when it’s almost over, the cut sets itself apart in a counterintuitive way—by delivering the most God-awful singing ever. With no AutoTune to save us, Kanye’s “spice it up” vamp is jarring like a cold-water plunge. And somehow it improves the song. I anticipate its horror over and over, like a GIF of a rowdy club-goer getting knocked sleepy by a bouncer. Mmmph. That’s terrible. Play it again. Mmmph! TERRIBLE! Again.
If you can escape that loop, you get to “The Game” with its grimy, filtered, bucket drums. DJ Premier executes masterful cuts on the chorus that give a mixtape feel. Along with “The People,” this served as Finding Forever’s double-A-side lead single though neither could hold chart attention.
“U, Black Maybe” opens strong (“I heard a White man's yes is a Black maybe”). This commentary on internal and external hardships of the Black experience gains more weight on a sobering coda where the message is made unmistakably plain. The track itself honors the work of one of Common’s best friends, revered producer J Dilla, who passed from a rare blood disorder on February 10, 2006. Like The Roots’ Game Theory (2007) or Q-Tip’s The Renaissance (2008), Finding Forever too is shaped by that loss.
Dilla famously recorded Donuts (2006) from his hospital bed at Cedar-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. One selection “Bye” was slated to become the remix to “Go!” With those plans scrapped though, it surfaced as “So Far to Go” on Dilla’s posthumous The Shining (2006). Its bare-naked eroticism gets dialed down on new Finding Forever verses though D’Angelo’s feature stays intact.
The vibe brightens back up with the fluffy, pink bounce of “Break My Heart,” a love-on-the-run story that shares some intersections with his real-life romance with actress Taraji P. Henson. Common uses his multihyphenate status to spit game (“She said, ‘You know I don’t be datin' rappers’ / I said, ‘I got my SAG card, baby. I'm an actor!’”). Until I heard this song, I was unaware that jazzman George Duke also sang. I thought Kanye had sampled an obscure ‘70s songstress.
‘Ye stands down on “Misunderstood” though, letting his cousin Devo Springsteen twiddle the knobs. A sample of Nina Simone’s “Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” magnifies the morality in Common’s parables. As I said, he’s generally peace loving. He’s come a long way since lighting Ice Cube up on “The Bitch in Yoo,” and seems committed to shedding his hip-hop-hardened misogyny in layers over time. The residue that leaks onto “Misunderstood” is a byproduct of that process. Any preachiness is unintentional. Common just sounds hotepian even when not actively hoteptifying.
In a different context, that voice is uplifting. Once you get past Paul Simon’s distractingly recognizable “50 Ways to Leave Your Lover,” the Bilal-assisted epilogue “Forever Begins” could only come from a post-Electric Circus Common. Like “U, Black Maybe,” it extracts soul from Syreeta Wright’s 1972 debut. Moreover, it was one of the last times we heard from Common’s father, Lonnie “Pops” Lynn. Until his passing in 2014, he had been appearing on his son’s records sharing griot wisdom and free-associated reflections on life, culture, and hip-hop since “Pops Rap” on Resurrection (1994).
Come awards season, the Recording Academy was ready to snub again. Finding Forever got nominated in three categories, but took a backseat to one competitor: Kanye West and his monster Graduation (2007). Fortunately, one of those categories was Best Rap Performance By A Duo or Group. Kanye’s win was also Common‘s. That’s right. It wasn’t even a single and they gave a golden gramophone to that raggedy-fantastic “Southside,” even with Kanye warbling like a Pomeranian in a paint mixer.
Common stayed with G.O.O.D. Music for one more disc, but regretted it wasn’t with Kanye who was busy touring behind Graduation. Instead, he let The Neptunes craft Universal Mind Control (2008) for him. It worked on paper, but few other places. He’d get back on track for The Dreamer/The Believer (2011), but the more we zoom out on Common’s risk-taking explorations, the better Forever looks.
As to which gold-certified album is superior, Be sold significantly better, but Finding Forever debuted at #1 eventually topping Pop, R&B, and Rap charts. When you start arguing stats though, key factors are already lost. Whichever one finds a place in your ears and heart, moves you to introspect, and gets you rapping extra loud in your car? That’s the superior album. Never mind a GRAMMY. “Southside” can make me shake my dreadlocks at a stop light, even when I know someone is looking over at me. That’s an award everybody can’t get.
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Like Water For Chocolate (2000) | Be (2005) | Let Love (2019)
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