Pitchfork

Lil Wayne and Kanye West have been volleying the title of World's Most Fascinating Pop Star back and forth since Weezy rose to West's level last year. Wayne does condoms; Kanye does a collared shoe. Wayne shoots a web video of himself stunting while eating steak frites; Kanye shoots a web video of himself stunting while clutching Louis Vuitton luggage. Wayne puts out a fucked up album filled with zonked-out spaceman references; Kanye puts out a fucked up album filled with paranoid ex-girlfriend references. It's a tight, tight race. But, ladies and gentlemen, Wayne is pulling ahead in 2009.

There's his rock'n'roll album, Rebirth, featuring Papa Roach-meets-a-strangled-cat lead single "Prom Queen" (and the even stranger, Green Day-quoting, TV on the Radio-sounding "Hot Revolver"). And now he's bowling with Katie Couric as part of her "All Access Grammy Special", which airs February 4 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CBS and also features chats with Justin Timberlake, Katy Perry, and Taylor Swift.

Which is all well and good. But there's no way those other pop stars will come close to matching Wayne's tick-tick-boom Travis Bickle magnetism in this 88-second preview of the interview:

The WTF moments come at a maddening clip. First, there's the premise: Katie Couric holding Wayne's arm affectionately while at a bowling alley-- it's like watching Wayne walk your mom across the street. And then his dead-serious heart-on-sleeve answers to questions about his dad, Hurricane Katrina, and George W. Bush. Couric asks him, "If you had to ask President Bush a question about Katrina, what would it be?" Wayne: "I'm a gangsta and gangstas don't ask questions." Which is a typical bad ass hip-hop answer...but he says it with his fist on his chin, perilously close to crying. And that's Wayne's pull in one tiny snippet-- the living embodiment of a tattooed tear.

And Couric lets slip that Wayne will be performing a song about Katrina on the Grammys, so good money is on Tha Carter III's New Orleans lament "Tie My Hands". Accept his emotion.

In other Wayne news, RollingStone.com reports that the rapper has settled a lawsuit with Rolling Stones publishers Abkco after claims that C3's "Playing With Fire" was strikingly similar to the Stones' "Play With Fire". It has been removed from digital versions of the album. The faux-metal track was one of my favorites from the album, so it's a shame that it's gone. But it's been replaced by live favorite "Pussy Monster", so things could be worse.

Overall: Wayne-- still that dude.