It wasn't. It was just such a deviation that folks, even his fans, weren't ready for it. And understandably so, to some degree.

But as time went on a lot of folks, and specifically/most importantly his core fans, started to understand it better and praise it for its fearlessness and risks. So while I can understand him wanting to "come back to earth" and refer to EC as an artistic phase, for lack of a better way to phrase it .. I've never understood why he's consistently distanced himself from it as a work of art. It's almost like he was listening to the feedback of the wrong fans.

I wish he'd embrace it for the artistic statement that it was and is, flaws and all. In a lot of ways he was ahead of his time and could even probably take some credit for a lot of the high quality weirdness that was to come in hip-hop.

But instead he barely acknowledges it, it seems. Which sucks, but I do suspect that it may relate in some ways to the fact that the album came out when he was full-on with Erykah. In other words maybe his admonishment of the album is less about the art and more about a period in his personal life he'd rather forget. And to be clear that's no shade @ Erykah. I just think that maybe their broken engagement had an impact on him, to the extent that he'd rather forget that whole period of his life both personally and artistically. Especially since I think a lot of what he was doing artistically was seemingly being influenced and encouraged by her.

That's my armchair psychoanalysis, anyway. lol


>I find that disappointing...it's one of my favorite albums
>ever.
>Plus, after that, his music got so...safe.
>(UMC was weird, but not in a good way.)