Michigan Boy Boat - Lil Yahcty: Review

Lil Yachty

is an Atlanta rapper who first emerged in the latter half of the last decade with a unique and fun sound on his Lil Boat Mixtape. Since then he has released an inconsistent series of projects that pivoted completely from his individual sound into something much more commercial.

Review By Lav:

There have been a couple of times in Yachty's discography that I've really enjoyed his sound. His breakout mixtape is still one of the most idiosyncratic pieces of contemporary trap out there and the sequel is a more commercial leaning hard-hitting affair. Even on last years Lil Boat 3 there were plenty of solid tracks among the bloated 19 song tracklist. Unfortunately everything not in the Lil Boat series has been pretty disappointing from Yachty so far and I was hoping this would break that trend. Yachty collected a bunch of artists from Michigan to feature all across this album and occasionally highlights some excellent unique voices. But unfortunately for the most part this is a pretty mediocre project whose highlights are even a bit tempered. 

Lets get to those highlights real quick starting with Dynamic Duo, an icy hard-hitting collaboration with Tee Grizzly. Tee definitely gets old with his identical delivery throughout but when Yachty comes in on the back end and spits one of his more charming verses on the record it wraps up one of the more solid tracks here. G,I, Joe features another energetic Yachty performance and a solid feature both of whcih go really well over the rattling trap beat. Fight Night Round 3 is a fun song with an unconventional beat that is surprisingly hard-hitting. The features also have a ton of charisma with Yachty which adds up to quite a good track. 

Hybrid is a really interesting late album highlight that starts off with a great feature that brings interesting vocals and a tight flow. It feels like the kind of thing Schoolboy Q always tries to do but never can. Yachty himself is also pretty good on the track and the results are all good.  Ghetto Boy Shit is a great cut that features RMC Mike sounding like a killer fusion of E-40 and Busta Rhymes. Yachty matches that energy clearly not taking himself too seriously and spitting some hilariously oversexualized bars. Never Did Coke is so obviously the best song on the album which feels weird since its the biggest feature with Swae Lee, but he has nothing to do with Michigan that I know of. It's way better written with a stronger beat and more well thought out structure than anything else here. I can't complain about how good the song is but it does feel like a weird moment at the core of a Michigan themed album. 

One of the bigger flaws of the record is that there are so many instantly forgettable tracks that are easy to forget the moment they turn off. The intro Final Form is like this so is the closing posse cut This That One and both of the Sada Baby cuts SB 2021 and SB5. Unfortunately this is far from the worst the record has to offer as some of thee tracks are painfully underwritten and poorly thought out. Concrete Goonies is a short two minute track that feels like Yachty isn't even trying to rap on the beat. Not in a Blueface kind of way though it's almost like he just wrote the verse without any flow and is just reading it over a beat. Don't Even Bother has a similar problem though this time the featured verse is even worse than Yachty's. Plastic features another lazy ass flow but and two more underwhelming features making for perhaps the albums biggest single miss. Stunt Double does have a funny joke on the hook about having so much sex that you need a stunt double, but there isn't much here that's blowing me away aside from some funny lyrics. The actual hook itself is pretty average and the feature is one of the worst on the record so the equation doesn't add up all that well. 

Michigan Boat Boy has just as many misses as hits and the misses miss harder than the hits hit. That was a mouthful. But the whole project adds up to a super mediocre collection of tracks that isn't necessarily terrible, but is forgettable. The Michigan concept is a great but the execution here is pretty weak both with underwhelming features and poorly written and executed songs. The interpolation of the various talents doesn't do many of these lesser known artists any favorites and Swae Lee basically steals the entire show with his great feature on the best track. Ultimately I'm still waiting on Yachty to return to his off the wall creativity, but with every record it seems less and less likely. 5/10 

Album Cover Review By Tyler Judson:

This cover gets the job done and represents the album well. I'm personally not a fan of the drawing style and I don't think it works well in the form factor most will see it in which is a phone screen. It's very busy but composed well and if you're from Michigan I'm sure you will get a kick out of analyzing the small details. I'm not a fan but it's not awful. 6.5/10

For more trap check out my review of Slime Language 2 here