Ok, so this is a bit old, but I just found it flipping thru a mag at work. Some of you have probably already read it, hell, someone might even have posted it. I dunno. But here it is:

People Magazine
October 2003 issue
review

Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

With 39 tracks totaling more than 135 minutes, OutKasts' new double disc is hands down the year's most ambitious release. Remarkably, though the sprawling set has some skip-worthy moments, much of it is nothing short of outstanding. For the first time the hip-hop duo worked seperately on the two CD's, with Big Boi helming Speakerboxxx and Andre 3000 handling The Love Below. Bi Boi's disc consists of the Southern-fried rap soaked in psychedelic soul that fans have come to expect from OutKast. He brings a decidedly offbeat sense of humour to his rhymes ("You a Chuck E. Cheese bouncer chumpin' off the boss," on Bust) while also displaying a social consciousness on songs such as "War." But it is Andre 3000's CD that is the real revelation. Largely foregoing rapping for singing, Dre makes a daring disc that harks back to the early days of Prince both with its eclectic funk and it's dirty mind. From the "Delirious"-like bounce of "Hey Ya" to the quirky beauty of "Take Off Your Cool", his acoustic, blues-hued duet with Norah Jones, this is the best Prince album that Prince never made.

meow85 said:

how many times are we going to hear this?

purpleone said:

As many times as it takes for Prince to take heed and make another Prince album I suppose.

whodknee said:

Yeah. Prince hasn't been making Prince albums for quite some time. He can take a new direction all he wants -nobody's stopping him. But when he does something that's a complete departure -Rainbow Children comes to mind (btw, I mean more so lyrically than musically. Yes, he's always had a strong belief in God, but he didn't use to alienate his fans or the few remaining casual listeners either) that's when things is just not cool.

meow85 said:

I think the music world needs a Prince type person right now and Andre 3000 is the closest we can get. I mean, The Love Below is a great album but it pales in comparison to Prince's stuff. He used to write about God all the time and work it into his stuff (Purple Rain, Let's Go Crazy, The Ladder, etc.) in a crafty way and it sold like hotcakes. To be honest I would love to see him get up, record a kick ass album like Purple Rain or Diamonds & Pearls and just rock the world the way he used to. But at the same time, we cant' expect a 50 year old guy to write, play, and record the way he did when he was 25. Honestly I like the fact that he's taken a new direction because hearing him sing stuff like Gett Off and Darling Nikki while gyrating and all that...it would just be like the Stones, and God they should have retired 20 years ago. But we can always go back and spin Purple Rain, Lovesexy, and anything else anytime we want. Not everyone may like the stuff he's doing now, but you can always look back and remember...But Andre's doing some solid shit and I think it's good that he and a lot of artists nowadays are taking inspiration from people like Prince. It means they're thinking musically.

I couldn't get enough of TLB when I first got it but now I'm really just playing 4-5 tracks (like hey ya, spread, draculs's wedding...) from it and skipping the rest. I sure have never done that with SOTT.