Metal Lungies

When “I’m Beaming” first leaked on December 23, Lupe Fiasco responded with a tirade against the leakers and an emotional appeal to fans not to “share, stream, or download any unauthorized or stolen Lupe Fiasco music.”

“Plain and simple its STOLEN property. And this goes for ANY record or track that leaks or is made available for illegal download from this day forward,” Lupe wrote on his blog.

Fine. Mainstream hip-hop blogs took down the song as did YourAudioFix.com, which premiered the song. Everybody acted like the song didn’t exist even though you could probably still find it on the first page of Google results.

Today, the song resurfaced with the blessing of Atlantic Records. According to OnSMASH, Lupe’s label sent out the song to bloggers.

Wait, what? It sounded like Lupe put his foot down when he said “ANY record or track that leaks or is made available for illegal download” was stolen — unless downloading “I’m Beaming” isn’t illegal anymore now that Atlantic is encouraging it.

According to Lupe’s blog, the song will be for sale on iTunes on Tuesday.

When the song first leaked, he wrote, “My music is the product of my life…So to see it treated in this manner really numbs the soul.”

He added, “And for those of you unsympathetic enough not to understand i can only compare it to someone breaking into your house and stealing everything not tied down or someone kidnapping you sister or brother and ransoming them back to you. A deep sense of helplessness. I hope you never have to feel this and i wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy.”

Wow. But if a song leaking is the equivalent of your brother being kidnapped, why did Atlantic Records happily leak the song to bloggers today?

In a follow-up post, Lupe wrote, “THESE MATERIALS WERE NEVER MEANT TO BE IN THE PUBLIC SPACE IN THIS MANNER OR ANY MANNER UNTIL STRICT AND CLEAR AUTHORIZATION WAS GIVEN BY THE OWNERS OF THE MUSIC.”

Is a blast from Atlantic records “strict and clear authorization”?

Lupe gave a similar rant when “Shining Down” leaked. He wrote, “I DONT LEAK MY OWN RECORDS!!! I’M NOT A FAN OF LEAKING RECORDS OR OF DOWNLOADING!!!” In the same post, he writes about leaking songs to The LupE.N.D. Blog and Nah Right.

You can’t act like the blogger who posted your song stole your soul when you were going to leak it yourself less than a month later.

In any case, I like the early version better than the official. Great song.

Download: Lupe Fiasco – I’m Beaming (produced by The Neptunes) (Early Version)

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