Another year has passed, and in the wake of “eleven number ones” as he casually mentions on “Lorraine Interlude”, T-Pain delivers another LP of millennial computer love, with Thr33 Ringz. Comparing the rap game to a circus, Pain crowns himself the ringleader, as he essentially is the main ingredient to every other artists’ respective hit singles released in the last year (“Good Life”, “Low”, “Kiss Kiss”, “I’m So Hood”; take your pick). So, with Thr33 Ringz, we get a massive 17 track LP (not including bonus tracks you might find at various different retailers), but unfortunately Pain once again proves that syrup isn’t good all by itself.

On one hand, credit must be given to T-Pain for coming up with original concepts, despite the fact that many of his songs sound alike – catchy or otherwise. His perspective on things takes normal, overdone themes and re-envisions them with a unique vantage point that could only be seen through T-Pain’s sunglasses. For instance, “Chopped and Screwed” – perhaps the album’s best track – finds Pain and Ludacris speaking on female players, all by doing so over a chopped and screwed track, doubling the meaning of the song’s title. Later, we find the stripper-obsessed T-Pain lamenting that champagne room entertainment is short-lived, so he crafts his own “Long Lapdance” song, only begging the question as to why this song wasn’t a half-hour. In perhaps his best moment, the album closer, “Karaoke” finds an angry Pain dissing all of the biters of the autotune style he reintroduced – rapping with no vocoder. He pardons Weezy and Yeezy, however.

On the same token, his creative conceptual mind works against him, oft times with corny results. The god-awful lead single and duet with Lil Wayne, “Can’t Believe It” force-rhymes words like “cabin” and “Aspen” or “beach house” and “Costa Rica”, over the sleepiest of beats. Meanwhile, “Superstar Lady” is a lame solo joint where Pain describes his perfect woman, who is made up of different parts of…. wait for it…. female R&B singers. “Reality Show” is another awful concept where T-Pain compares a relationship to a…um, do I really even have to finish this sentence?  Also particularly bad is “Change”, a blasphemous posse cut that borrows from Eric Clapton, as each Diddy, Akon, and Mary J. Blige try to inspire – and fail. Here, Akon suggests “Race crimes, hate crimes would never exists / I’d turn every bullet to a Hershey’s Kiss / And we could eat away our fears!” Huh?

However, for the most part, Pain’s guest artists help him, rather than hinder him. While this is an average collection of songs at best, the addition of numerous guest artists balances things out a bit. The aforementioned “Chopped and Screwed” owes a lot to Ludacris, while Kanye’s hilarious verse on “Therapy” makes it worth the download. Both Chris Brown and Ciara commandeer their selections (“Freeze” and “Blowing Up”), lending their own styles to each, and both will probably end up as hit singles.

While T-Pain may be the flavor of the month, it’s hard to imagine how he will reinvent himself once the talkbox sound has played itself out (read: 2007). Thr33 Ringz is a better LP than his previous two, but reaffirms what we’ve always known about T-Pain; this ringleader can’t have a circus without several different acts to perform with him. – D.T. Swinga