After a five year hiatus from releasing a new studio album, Atlanta rapper Playboi Carti released ‘MUSIC’ to mixed opinions from his fans.
‘MUSIC’ features 30 tracks with many of the songs being shorter than 3 minutes long. The shorter songs combine with the high number of tracks leads to the album clocking in around an hour and a half in length.
Some of the stronger songs are the ones that were leaked prior to the release of the album, mainly ‘EVIL J0RDAN,’ which includes a snippet from Playboi Carti’s feature on The Weeknd’s ‘Popular,’ which also features pop star Madonna, and ‘HBA’, where Playboi Carti sings of Ray Charles and freezing cold weather.
Another standout include a collab with Young Thug and Ty Dolla $ign ‘WE NEED ALL DA VIBES,’ and exciting and up-beat song where Playboi Carti takes a backseat and lets his features work, which works well since most of the songs that came before are just Playboi Carti.
‘TRIM’ was another song that took be by surprise due to the great feature from Future giving the beat from Swamp Izzo everything he has while backing up Playboi Carti’s mediocre verse.
My personal favorite currently is ‘RATHER LIE’ with The Weeknd. Everything about this song is simply better than everything else on the album. Playboi Carti and The Weeknd’s use of lyricism is a surprising change from most of the songs where you cannot tell what Playboi Carti is saying at all. The songs producers F1LTHY and Swamp Izzo contribute to this songs greatness with an amazing and memorable beat.
While ‘RATHER LIE’ has an excellent beat, Swamp Izzo doesn’t have this same effect on many of the other songs. Izzo, while providing production for 13 of the songs, some of his beats and adlibs make the song unlistenable. The worst of which is on ‘OPM BABI’ with adlibs that mimic weapons being shot. As a result, the song just sounds corny and is one of my least favorites on the album.
Before the album released, Playboi Carti also revealed the features would include longtime collaborator Lil Uzi Vert, bringing excitement from many fans of the duos previous work. However, disappointment strikes again. Lil Uzi is featured in two songs on the album, JUMPIN’ and ‘TWIN TRIM’ which are both unfortunately forgettable and short, with the times of both songs being about 1 minute 30 seconds for both.
My biggest issue with the album is how short each song is. Another song that I liked titled ‘FINE S***’ is only a minute and a half long. The short tracks contribute heavily to the album’s mediocrity.
Overall, ‘MUSIC’ isn’t the worst thing I have ever listened to, ranking in around a 6/10 but it is extremely disappointing considering the album was cancelled and delayed over the period of five years.
It started in 2020, when the Atlanta rapper released his third album ‘Whole Lotta Red’ on Christmas day. The album featured the likes of Kid Cudi and Kanye West and boasted 24 tracks.
Soon after ‘Whole Lotta Red’, Playboi Carti quickly announced his next project titled ‘NARCISSIST’ in Aug. 2021, claiming the new album would be out on Sept 13. The album did not release on this date and the ‘NARCISSIST’ title was quietly forgotten by Playboi Carti.
On April 12, 2022, ‘MUSIC’ titled and known by fans as ‘I AM MUSIC,’ was announced in the XXL magazine cover feature with no release date. The album would sit until the two-year anniversary of ‘Whole Lotta Red’ when a photo to promote the album was posted onto Instagram. Again, this would lead to nothing for fans.
After multiple snippets of new songs got leaked, many teasing Instagram posts from Playboi Carti of a bald British man announcing his new songs including ‘2024,’ ‘BACKR00MS,’with Travis Scott and ‘ALL RED’ all coming out before ‘MUSIC’.
Except for these small samples of new music, Playboi Carti would end up delaying his album for almost five years until a promise of new music along with the CD, vinyl record and merchandise for ‘Music’ would be released, with a message promising that the album would be soon released and if it wasn’t all customers would receive a refund.
The final date for the album to drop for Playboi Carti to not lose any money made from sales would be March 14th, the Friday on which the album was finally released to fans 6 hours after the intended midnight.
After five years of waiting, Playboi Carti has already teased his next project, now titled ‘BABYBOI’ to release hopefully sooner than his other projects did.