Let's Start Here - Lil Yachty: Review
has existed in the music industry for years predominately as a rapper, albeit one with a very unique style and cadence who does occasionally sing. After an up and down career by most measures thus far Yachty swung for the fences with Let's Start Here a radical shift in sound into the worlds of 70s soul and psychedelic rock. On board are collaborators like Mac DeMarco as well as members of Magdalena Bay and MGMT.
Review by Lav:
Review by Lav:
I've covered Yachty many times on this blog, most recently with 2021's Michigan themed project. So I feel pretty equipped to say Yachty is most commonly defined by his inconsistencies, though he's never been afraid of taking risks to sound different than the pack. But nothing in his entire catalog comes anywhere close to the level of artistic venturing that Let's Start Here achieves, reaching into another universe of styles from where he originated. Unlike prior artists who tried to turn from hip-hop to rock in the most generic ways possible like Logic and Vic Mensa, Lil Yachty proved he had both a better care for the source material and an ability to find more inspired source material in the first place. The result is a record that doesn't feel like Yachty borrowing from anything, just taking influence and creating sonic spaces all his own.
In the spirit of some of his psych-rock muses, Yachty saves the best songs on the record for the opener and closer. the BLACK seminole is out first taste and it's the song everyone has been talking about both because it's the first exposure we get to his new style, but also because it's genuinely epic. From the whirring guitar solo to the wandering lucid compositional shifts everything about the song is just impressive worship of the classics in a way I never expected from Yachty. REACH THE SUNSHINE might be even better as a closer that feels absolutely otherwordly during its climaxes even given how grounded it can be during its simplest acoustic moments. I love the contrast and every time the song slips from one to another it pulls it off perfectly, working both as an individual statement and a grand finale to the record.
While those are the best and most memorable moments on the record they're hardly the only highlights. I seem to be the only person who likes paint THE sky but it's a love song that I find exceedingly charming. It opens with some blown out synths and distant vocals but its all a set up for the burst of musical clarity that I didn't think the album even had in it. When Yachty's melodies just suddenly burst into the front of the mix alongside those tattering drums it made me love the song. I also enjoyed WE SAW THE SUN quite a bit. It's appropriate that sun would be in the name of this song because the track feels absolutely sun-bleached in a way that grew on me every time I heard it. The way everything just feels so frizzled out but it all comes together around those heavy-handed sonic crashes. It's a challenging song but one I enjoyed more with each listen.
Diana Gordon shows up for two songs back to back on the album and makes great additions each time. drive ME crazy! comes first and its the part in the tracklist where the record starts to feel less like classic psych and more like classic soul but it still grabs me nonetheless. Diana gets so much of the track and she just makes it soar with retro stylings that suit her voice perfectly. On the following I'VE OFFICIALLY LOST VISION Yachty actually takes a step into the role of some larger-than life rock singer type ad while his vocals still get a bit drowned out by the instrumentation throughout it's still used to appropriate dramatic effect in moments like the end of the verses.
One thing we should talk about while it's coming up now is Yachty's vocals. His admittedly quite limited range has been a big subject of debate surrounding the album and while I think he manages to pull off most of what he sets out to do, there are moments I'm less than crazy about. the ride- is a collaboration with Teezo Touchdown who I've never been crazy about after he made a few big flop appearances on albums I've reviewed in recent years. This actually makes a lot better use of his talents despite his vocals also being quite limited in an entirely different way than Yachty's. Despite that, neither of them feel quite capable enough of serving the spawls of epic psychedelic instrumentation surrounding them. The only point where the vocals are a crippling problem for me is on should i B? where the verses are awkwardly overdone and then they transition into a hook that is genuinely under-sung. It's a sham because the songwriting and instrumentation have a lot of potential but the vocal performance really needed another try.
One of the things I like the most about Let's Start Here is that Yachty doesn't demand attention constantly across the record. He almost serves a similar role to a classic band leader type orchestrating this gathering of great musicianship but non insisting that he star in it. The Alchemist seems to take this dichotomy head on through its lyrics though the most sonically satisfying example of Yachty playing this role comes on running out of time. I also want to shout out failure a song where Yachty delivers a pretty honest reflection on failure that draws from his silliness while also tapping into something pretty real. Given Yachty's up and down history artistically and the triumphant reception this album is receiving I think it's fair to call this the record's centerpiece, or at the very least its mission statement.
Yachty also did his homework when it comes to classic psych and tries to fill out the record with tracks that check all the boxes. pRETTy is the albums horny anthem alongside Foushee who adds a massive air of conventional sensuality to Yachty's silliness. It's a fun song even if it's hard to imagine being intimate to Yachty's warbling vocals that sound like he's back in Poland. say something starts off pretty conventionally for the record but the second half sort of shifts into something much poppier. This would be the song that gets cut down into a radio edit that is somehow a success despite sounding nothing like the rest of the album.
I like this album. If you had told me ahead of time Yachty would divulge into something psych rock and soul inspired I would have bet it would be pretty controversial but the pretty universal praise the album is receiving tells me something different entirely. This album does a wonderful job at translating Yachty's influences while putting his own charming schtick on everything. It really does feel like a wonderful arrangement of talent with a real admiration for the era of music they're querying from and as surprised as I am, I'm even more happy and excited or Yachty. Whether or not this is the best project he's ever released would require me to dive deep on Lil Boat The Mixtape for the first time in years, but just the fact that it's in consideration alone is a wonderful mood for 2023. 7.5/10
For more psych check out my review of Mac DeMarco's Five Easy Hot Dogs here
