Whole Lotta Red Review

 

    2020 has been anything but normal, and if you thought that Playboi Carti would swoop in and save the year with the elusive, whispered in legends-type of album Whole Lotta Red, you might be disappointed. The baby voiced, mumble rap Sinatra will leave you feeling like all that hype was misplaced, or leave you feeling like “what the hell have I been getting my hopes up for?” Bogged down by his own self-inhibiting, limited lyrical talent and energizing sound, Playboi Carti completely misses the mark with this release. His self-titled mixtape and debut studio record Die Lit showed a lot of promise for the young Atlanta rapper, but the glaring issues with both of those projects are at the forefront yet again on Whole Lotta Red, along with a hell of a lot of new problems. It’s hard to live up to the hype, even if you are the dude who “invented music” as the kids somewhat (and hopefully) say in a joking manner. Whole Lotta Red succeeds in capturing his infectious sound and trademark energetic confidence but with zero refinement and a disgusting combination of new, but horrid sounds. Everything that could possibly go wrong on this release with the song writing and production do so in a spectacular and hilarious fashion, and sadly not even the bravado and energy oozing out of Carti’s personality can save this album from its nose dive into oblivion.

    The signs of Cartis’s downfall were perhaps clear in sight with the release of “@ MEH” earlier this year, and if that track was a red flag towards what was to come on WLR, we were surely in for a disappointment. The track featured chopped up chords and some of his worst vocal performances to date. The track was reminiscent of some kid coked out on Snickers bars and layered with god-awful auto tune along with the production that was accented with electronic, spacy synths that came off as annoying and made it impossible for him to flow over it with any grace or streamlined execution. Ultimately scrapped after the backlash it received, the fact it doesn’t make the final cut is a blessing, but with everything on this album endlessly layered and cheap, it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference if the track ended up on here after all. Playboi Carti needs to learn a thing about quality over quantity, and which cuts make the album, as this thing showcases all of the worst and least refined elements of Carti’s style. Most of these tracks are horridly combined with the most jarring, punk-like production qualities (which are terrible), low grade, run of the mill trap elements  and his most atrocious song writing ever.

    WLR comes in running a little over one hour long, with a whopping 24 tracks. First off, any project can have the issue of not having enough material, simply due to the fact of too few tracks. Secondly, any album can also be way too long and oversaturated because of too many tracks. Carti’s problem is the latter here, and the first track on this isn’t starting the project on a high note. “Rockstar Made” is a retroactive take on everything wrong from his first two projects, sounding like an abusive, cheaper version of something off of his first self-titled mixtape. The bass is generic and dialed to 11, layered with synths that are like nails on a chalkboard, horridly pitched and lacking any direction whatsoever. Cuts like “Punk Monk” and “New Tank” exemplify the issue Carti has with adding in tracks that are unnecessary and make you wonder how they made it onto WLR. Both these songs have the same glaring issues; disgusting, overwhelming bass drums thrown together with cheap, spaced-out reverberating synths that have been put through a blender to deliver the most brain melting sounds he has ever decided to use. While Carti has struggled with finding the right groove to operate within on his past projects, it doesn’t get much better on this hype filled mess.

    Sonically speaking, this album SOUNDS very different from a lot of stuff out in the genre right now, but many of the tracks on here share a lot of the same problems as each other, either mixed too loud and poorly that they are literally unplayable, or they are generic run-off-the mill trap instrumentals combined with these newfound artistic persuasions, corny synths and childish elements that make Playboi Carti sound like a kid throwing a tantrum in the candy store. Sure this thing is a bit experimental, but in with his music, you can only afford a little toe dip into those kinds of waters, as the effort and creativity with his music is only burdened by the disingenuous attempt at “delivering a new classic.” Tracks like “Place” have the most simple, meaningless bass and percussion, and the monstrous synth note constantly rising and falling throughout the cut is moderately catchy, but maybe it’s the frequencies layered on it or the depth and textures that make the sound absolutely migraine inducing. The cut “Meh,” which might have replaced “@ MEH” features production that is so cut and dry with abusive bass and annoying synths in the background, fighting and vying for their moment, that the track feels like two constantly jarring sounds wanting to outdo the other. “On That Time” is a track on here that again, has bass that is mixed so poorly it sounds like it is trying to kill you by rupturing your eardrums, and cheap synth keys in the instrumental sound like shrieking that has been reverbed endlessly and in a corny, melodic arrangement. There are also ringing synth bells on this cut that make you wince in pain as they sound like muffled screams. Other poor production elements on this project come off of the track “Not PLaying.” While the drums come off as nothing special or poor, the robotic synths in the song highlight the necessity Carti has with more, as they hit constantly and never in a solid pattern with each other, overwhelming the listener with numbing computer bleeps and blurps. Finally, the track “Vamp Anthem” shows why Carti has a hard time going outside the box and experimenting with production elements, as the chopped up Count Dracula organ notes are horrific and have no business being on here at all.

    Going into this, there was never any expectation to see crazy lyricism and highly structured, creative songwriting. However, Carti had shown from his last two projects that he was on the right path, with Die Lit actually featuring some pretty creative elements in that regard. Whole Lotta Red is the complete opposite, falling flat on its face and containing some of Carti’s most ridiculous, low effort, god awful songwriting that has ever graced listener’s ears. Cuts such as “JumpOutTheHouse” is mindless repetition that drones on and on, with Carti rapping “Jump out the house”, “Jump out that bitch”, “Racks I’m talkin bout racks”, and other such ridiculous phrases like “Fit, I ain’t even drive it.” Every single damn phrase is uttered again and again, making this track only have 27 unique words (Counted myself, twice).  Even for Carti’s standard that is ridiculously low. Other tracks like “No Sl33p” show that Carti can’t seem to stick with a flow or vocal inflection style, forcing out his lyrics in a way that sounds like he is running out of air. That glaring problem coupled with the most annoying and mediocre songwriting Carti has ever produced makes this track not even worthy of being on the B-sides version of this record. Carti, without any effort on his part, croons “When I go to sleep I dream ‘bout murder,” constantly repeating with a lack of energy. He sounds so atrocious here, as if the auto tune is fighting him and making it harder for him to sound appealing. “F33l Lik3 Dyin,” a track that samples Bon Iver's "iMi," has Carti do his worst Juice Wrld imitation, agonizingly trying to harmonize and hit notes he just cannot do, with the auto tune making him sound like a malfunctioning robot. The one that takes the cake though is on the song “Meh” where Carti sings like a dying cat “Johnny Cage, beat it up under covers, gotta have rubber, or else I’m in trouble.” Come on dude. The worst part is that while this is super corny and idiotic, Carti sounds like he is rhyming “rubber” with “trubber,” with his inflections changing the sound of “trouble” and forcing it to rhyme. This makes the bar that much worse and laughably poor. The overall songwriting is so sub-par that it is hard to even find anything that would be considered a bright spot lyrically, and almost all of his energy and confidence is misguided, never once hitting the nail on the head to give us one solid and meaningful track.

    The features on here, except for Kid Cudi, don’t really do anything interesting either. On “Go2DaMoon,” while the production is actually pretty creative with super spacy and psychedelic synths and some neat flute samples, Kanye’s feature is delivered with terrible execution and condescending tones. Kanye West comes off as lazy and flows in the most braggadocious way possible. His bars do not fit with the beat and rhythm in any shape or form at all, stopping and continually stuttering between the instrumental, never once saying anything memorable or necessary and constantly sounding like a spiteful child. In his ignorance, Kanye says “You always askin’ for Buddha, you a Budapest.” That is an undeniably corny bar and the fact that Kanye said this and got away with it shows how overrated he can be as an artist, not to mention he executive produced this record and engineered it to be a dumpster fire. Still, that problem is on Playboi Carti since it is his record after all so he should have been better about choosing his producers. The worst feature though is Carti and Future on the cut “Teen X.” A track about doing lean and molly, this track features lazy production and a synthed out xylophone loop that is layered and resonating, jaggedly rising throughout the track in a way that will give you nightmares. That’s not the worst part though, as the songwriting from both Carti and Future is at an all-time low for both of them. Carti, who can’t help but constantly repeat himself throughout Whole Lotta Red, begins repeating on this track “We on the X, we on the codeine.” Future comes in later with his guest spot and does not sound like himself at all. He sounds exactly like Young Thug, blatantly ripping off his sound and uttering nonsense about drugs and pussy and other ridiculous things. Maybe this project needed more features to spice it up and prevent it from sonically jading the listeners, but if those two horrific performances are an indication of that, perhaps no features at all would have been for the best.

      The bright spots on this album are few and far between, with the lyrics and song structures being pure garbage. The only other moments of praise on this 24 track heap of mediocrity are when Kid Cudi features, and the production on some other tracks is commendable. On “M3tamorphosis,” Carti actually sounds decent here, hitting us with some great energy, yet lacking any lyrical ability. Cudi’s hums throughout are intoxicating given the lackluster production, delivering a solid guest verse. When Carti repeats “metamorphosis” a few times it actually comes off as pretty nice, reminding the listener of that same head banging energy off of Die Lit. “Die4Guy” has some decent themes about brotherly love but lacks anything remotely invigorating lyrically and the way Carti delivers his vocals, coming off as uninterested and pitched like a soft child blurs the overall message of the track. The track “Beno!” is his most complete track on this project. Carti sounds a little rushed and struggling to keep up, but his signature baby voice is as good as it has ever been, clear and mixed quite well. The production is zany and has some real nice electronic synths and some minimalistic percussion, sounding like it could have been directly off of Playboi Carti or Die Lit.

    Playboi Carti has shown listeners that he can make infatuating music. His first two releases were a solid foundation for him and showed that he had the ability to follow up with something that might build upon Die Lit and deliver us into a musical world of his creation. The Atlanta trap artist has fallen victim to his own glaring issues though. The cuts on here were produced rather horribly and the song writing was disgusting, a sign he sparingly began to show after his first two projects. This record is a result of trying to do too much with talent that he ultimately does not possess, and is rather a regression back to a terrible blueprint of what mumble rap and trap music should be. Playboi Carti always tries to bring his confidence and engulfing energy into anything he does, but not having a plan and overloading the mind with too much of two different things will only take you so far. There are no redeeming concepts or themes on here at all that could possibly save this thing, and the only reason to possibly give it a listen is for the incredibly flawed production and occasional catchiness of tracks. Whole Lotta Red is a disastrous attempt to recapture, or rather transform the flame of his former glory, and it exploded directly into his face in the most embarrassing and laughable way possible.

 

Score: 2/10