hey, this is from pitchfork media, good review, think the reviewer must be a fairly big prince fan, he mentions camille and TRC!

The twelve-lane Connector plows through Atlanta like the Nile of pavement. Along its fenced banks lie the majority of the city's attractions. Turner buildings, blossoming with neon network logos, lure Yellowjacket grads from the adjacent campus cluster with the sweet nectar of Powerpuff Girls money. Across the way, The Varsity serves grease between buns, communicating with a enigmatic fast food lexicon that rivals rhyming Cockneys. Tourists walk the overpass to the ghostly Olympic park, built on the graveyard of Techwood projects, in the shadows of Vick's pastel dome. Hipsters and reluctant yuppies settle in the gentrified Five Points and Cabbagetown, giving their quaint subdivisions more verdant "___ Park" monikers. And finally, there's Turner Field, reverberating collective October sighs, before the highway splits back into its tributaries in East Point, the cultural fountainhead. The hip-hop id to New York's ego: the home of Outkast.

Lauded retroactively in 2000 after the release of Stankonia for a formula that had been perfected by teenagers on 1994's Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, Outkast charged up the public with silly amounts of reserved anticipation. Since dropping that debut nearly ten years ago, Outkast's singles have charted a steady incline of genre defying and pop brilliance. But now, in the wake of the commercial and critical smash that yielded such classic tracks as "Ms. Jackson", "B.O.B.", and "So Fresh, So Clean", Big Boi and Andre 3000 have, for the first time, chosen to work in separate corners, like Beatles after India. Here, on the resulting Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, Outkast wander down the blacktop from East Point, each plotting their own distinct course: Andre, like I-85, shoots off to the airport and sky-high trips before dumping into the Mardi Gras marshes of New Orleans, while Big Boi rolls deep down I-75 into south Florida, home of booty bass and baby blue.

The consensus in rock circles had unfairly anticipated that The Love Below would reign supreme over Big Boi's Speakerboxxx, since Andre was the one with the guitar in the fuzzy boots. As it turns out, his Prince-mimicking fusion looks a lot better on paper than it sounds in your ears. On too many songs, Andre repeats space-playboy choruses over repetitious, unfinished digifunk. As the brief orchestrated outro to "Pink and Blue" suggests, each track feels like it's missing something-- strings, guitars, harmonies, organic instruments, and, oh right, Big Boi. Andre does have his moment, though: "Hey Ya" glitters and towers like the silver Westin hotel over an 80s Atlanta skyline, blending Flaming Lips-like synth-bass and ebullient acoustic guitar with the rebellious joy of "Little Red Corvette"-- and like all classic songs, it introduces new vernacular with a genius that transcends product placement. Even indymedia.org feeders will shout "Polaroid!" while miming spanking at this fall's Not-Dog cookouts.

Of the few other tracks on The Love Below that attempt to come close to reaching "Hey Ya"'s apex, the one that most succeeds is "Spread", which showcases trumpets and piano weaving through a rubber bassline and scattering rimshots. Its chorus has Andre putting on his Camille voice, while the verses contain some of the only moments in which he actually flows on the album. When he does, he's tight enough to pose the question of why he decided to cut back on rapping at all-- particularly since, frankly, he ranks just above Pharrell Williams on the "brilliant but mosquito-throated crooner" list. Elsewhere, the quite literal "Dracula's Wedding" boasts guest vocalist Kelis over whistling squelches, while Norah Jones' lovely turn on the acoustic "Take Off Your Cool" hints at the true stylistic breadth Andre is capable of achieving. "Baby, take off your cool/ I want to get to know you," they both sing over plucks and strums. Heed your lyrics, Andre. Except for that "become the master of your own bastion" nonsense.

Big Boi's Speakerboxxx coolly upstages its counterpart: though it, too, provides the world with one earthshaking single, it differs from The Love Below in that it also manages to maintain consistent brilliance and emotional complexity throughout. Here, Big Boi effectively asserts himself as man who wants both a stripper pole in his home and his nostalgic place saved on the pew-- "Unhappy" conveys that in its beat alone! Comparing the selection of Speakerboxxx to Andre's limper Love, it's clear who won this bet:

Machine-heavy, horn-driven funk stomps behind "Bowtie" and "The Rooster"; reverberating woodblocks (a trademark Outkast signifier since "Elevators") starkly soundtrack pondering rhymes on "Knowing"; "Church" takes gospel into the 21st Century, accelerating aluminum Stevie Wonder disco-pop into Teutonic techno; propulsive kickdrums pump under drunken guitars, scratches, and a Jay-Z hook on the standout "Flip Flop Rock"; and "Ghettomusick", the aforementioned earthshaking single, is, emotionally, a celebration and a lament, braggadocio and beatitudes. Musically, it shifts from punk-cadenced, cellulite-quivering woofer booms to three-wheeled slow-jamming and back before snake-charming with George Clinton keyboards.

Of course, there is one department in which neither disc succeeds: Despite how forward-looking these albums can be, both members have failed to envision a future WITHOUT SKITS AND INTROS (and outros), which make up no less than ten of the 39 tracks here. It's one reason why Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, like no albums before, beg to be ripped, sieved and re-sequenced. Cutting out the dialog, along with The Love Below's silicon-smooth, Rainbow Children-esque jazz and lulling middle-section, and Big Boi's guest-laden, been-there street tracks, leaves one genius full-length that fits on a single disc.

I think 95% of the reviews for "The Love Below" mention Prince.