Rapid Fire Reviews: Let's Get Trappy

Every year there are literally dozens and dozens, maybe even hundreds of trap records that either get reccomended to me or hyped up somewhere significant online. While I do cover major releases or records I anticipate being particularly good I wanted to take some time to play catch up with contemporary raps predominate sound, and it probably won't be the last time this year I do. 

Trip At Knight - Trippie Redd

Even though I have reviewed Trippie a few times in the past I decided to skip out on his two most recent major releases. Last years Pegasus was a bloated and very boring project that I didn't review because I didn't really have anything to say about it. He followed it up with the Travis Barker collaboration Neon Shark which I was hesitant of because of just how often Travis pops up on terrible trap music these days, but I actually thought it turned out decent. Given that it was really just a deluxe release of Pegasus I never got around to it but Trip At Night feels like a purposeful return to Trippie's core sound and style. One of the things you've gotta give Trippie on this record is that he often extracts pretty great performances from his features. XXXTENTACION, Ski Mark The Slump God and Playboi Carti all deliver highlight tracks with a number of different styles. While some of the more ridiculous tracks are also feature heavy they at least seem like some effort was put in and they're fun at the very least. That's one of the major ways I'd describe this record as just being a lot of fun, Trippie leans into his up-beat party vibes quite a bit and delivers a party ready album. That being said some of the typically shortcomings of Trippie's work show up here too. There are plenty of total duds in the tracklist which is extended out to 18 songs. Trippie has never been lyrical but there are still points where he flashes particularly choppy writing. And finally while so many of the beats here are bright and expressive there are some that are inexplicably plain and derail the hype the record builds up. This is certainly a step in the right direction but I wouldn't necessarily call it Trippie turning over a new leaf. 6.5/10

Just A Matter Of Slime - YNW Melly

This is a bit of a weird one for me. One of the biggest surprises of the last few years for me was how much I enjoyed YNW Melly's previous album Melly vs Melvin. While I know plenty of his hardcore fans liked the record I wasn't even that into his early work, yet I didn't see anybody else online hyping the record up. This got me extremely curious as to whether that was some kind of fluke or a phase I was in where the record really connected with me. But after revisiting Melvin and then listening through to Matter Of Slime I think I have to just admit that I'm a YNW Melly fan. This record once again lives in the world of heavily melodic feature heavy trap songs and honestly it might be done even better here on his last record. Melly clearly has a knack for writing compelling choruses and and the features here are varied but average out to a pretty good bunch. When you get Kodak Black to deliver a half decent verse on your track that is about as big a win as you can achieve with a trap record. Another big highlight is Melly's singing which continues to feature smooth melodies and emotionally heavy straining that I just find to be incredibly compelling. Between the solid performances throughout and the compositionally satisfying songs that often stretch beyond the scope of conventional trap and you've got a pretty good album on your hands here. While there are tracks and certainly a handful of features that don't live up to it, once again I find myself enjoying most of a YNW Melly record and curious about his future music prospects going forward. 7/10

The Voice Of The Heroes - Lil Baby & Lil Durk

I skipped this record when it came out earlier this year because I thought it had the potential to be a truly disastrous project. I've never really been that big a fan of Lil Durk though he's had flashes, and Lil Baby has been one of the least impressive artists in all of contemporary music with a painfully middling voice and no real ambition as a lyricist or performer. That's why I was surprised to see this record receive positive acclaim even with Lil Baby getting a lot of attention from mainstream outlets last year. For a collaborative rap project that features 18 tracks and an entire hour of material, you could honestly do a lot worse than this. Even though Lil Durk outperforms Lil Baby on nearly every track they do have an inherent chemistry and the songs feel truly collaborative rather than the poorly interpolated feature like link-ups that so many albums in this style execute. I also have to hand it to the pair for lyricism that far exceeds what either of them have ever presented before with about half the songs on the record having a distinct lyrical focus. Even with that being said there are some issues with the project, mainly that it's hour long runtime can feel like an absolute slog, The middle of the record in particular is quite the trudge where even a few highlights can't save the monotony of the listening experience. I also have to say I wasn't generally impressed by the beats on this record. They take a slightly more spacious and laid back approach than some trap album since I think there was a focus placed on lyricism, but the results make for very few truly memorable beats in the bunch. With inconsistent execution all over the tracklist and a few truly terrible Lil Baby performances the record is held back from it's potential, but I have to give both artists credit for making improvements to their craft and focusing on making something legitimately collaborative. 5.5/10

Hall Of Fame - Polo G

Polo G is a Chicago rapper who has been building up his fanbase over the last few years with a handful of successful singles and a pair of albums. His third effort Hall Of Fame finally saw him breaking through with a huge single in Rapstar. I hadn't paid much specific attention to Polo G so far and I ended up putting this record on the back burner because I didn't really love any of the singles I heard and the 20 track 54 minute length turned me away. While this isn't a bad record by any means I dare anyone to come up with anything about Hall Of Fame that can't also be used to describe almost every other trap album out today. Polo G dabbles in a number of different contemporary styles which makes it impossible to pick out anything distinct, unique or interesting about him. I feel like people who don't really enjoy this style of music think that it all sounds the same and while that's obviously not true, Polo G seemed to take that as a mission statement for this project from the lyrics to the flows, beats, hooks, subject matter and everything in between. Save for a few standout features and a few of the more noteworthy narrative tracks this thing is packed full of short, mostly indistinguishable songs. The lack of any compositional variety makes the record particularly difficult to sit through and only further reinforces how sonically identical all these songs are. Seriously the amount of songs on this record that are exactly 2 minutes and forty some odd seconds and run through the EXACT same progression make me wonder how anyone can enjoy this record in its entirety. 5/10