Playboi Carti — ‘Whole Lotta Red’ REVIEW
“Some would say eccentric. I would say stoned out of his fuckin mind, nothing personal.” — Thomas Pynchon, Inherent Vice
The follow up to Playboi Carti’s cult classic Die Lit was never supposed to be rolled out this way. After hinting of its existence and title ‘Whole Lotta Red’ in 2018, a ton of leaks followed from the its recording sessions in the subsequent years. These leaks were good and only flamed the fire for the album, but meant further edits and additions had to be made. After all, who in their right mind would put out an entire album filled with leaked songs?
The Whole Lotta Red studio sessions leaks were very popular because post-Die Lit, Playboi Carti began pivoting towards melody. Pissy Pamper the most revered of leaks distinctly has a pitched piano sample loop and the now signature Baby voice of Carti. This sound is opposed to the aggression and psychedelic style of Die Lit. He’d taken the slimy cartoonish aspects of Die Lit, i.e. Flatbed Freestyle and amplified them into simpler songs that were instantly recognisable and catchy.
On Red, Playboi Carti overturns these movements towards melodic appeal for uncompromised trap music. He uses Future’s Monster and DS2 as templates and pushes them somewhat further into an ecosystem of drug use, destruction and misogyny. Unlike Future, who is also featured on the album, Carti adopts the philosophy and persona of a late 70s punk rock lead. The album cover is a direct ode to Dave Vanian of The Damned and LA based, now defunct Slash Magazine. Little of the actual music is of resemblance to late 70s punk though, but the relentless energy, and left field attitude is present. At a stretch, the musical comparisons to 70s punk can be found in the use of repetitive hooks throughout Red, that is eerie of 2-minute punk songs featuring a singular guitar chord and only a handful of lyrics.
Rockstar Made the opener begins abruptly with the repetition of the phrase “Never too much” bolted over our heads. The music behind the song is unpolished and purposely mixed non-classically, i.e. not mixed well, to reflect the albums punk philosophy. To contrast this with other Playboi Carti Intro’s, they often begin in more mellow and celebratory fashion. The Harry Fraud produced Location has these synth pads that could soundtrack a Sci-fi flick, with Long Time — Intro taking us into the world of Die Lit introspectively over an Art Dealer produced ear worm. The choice to avert these existing patterns and open Whole Lotta Red in more aggressive fashion is a clear signal of change to whoever was waiting for this album.
Kanye West, whose Yeezus is already being stated as inspiration for the rebellious ethos of Whole Lotta Red shows up on the Wheezy produced Go2DaMoon. His verse is a delight of clever and witty wordplay that still adheres to his dedication to Jesus Christ himself, I.e. there are no expletives to be found here. Wheezy’s production is sparse and cinematic. It features a sample of an operatic violin that appear and disappear sporadically within the song’s mix. Carti’s verse is also preceded by a near 20 second stretch of only ad-libs and 808s also within and out of flux of the mix.
Go2DaMoon is an anomaly for the style of production on Red, with a majority of the tracks akin to the opener Rockstar Made. Aggressive tracks like Rockstar made are plentiful on Red. Stop Breathing, No SL33P, New Tank and JumpOutTheHouse to name a few. There is a thread of an emerging theme throughout these tracks and all of the songs on Red, that is in opposition to the high burst of energy that the production reflects. Playboi Carti comes across immensely sad and paranoid.
His music has never been the type to indulge in emotional depth but instead choosing to reflect the suave and cavalier attitude of a lady’s man. But on Red he openly laments on a public breakup( Over, Teen X) and on the loss of trust with his record label (Punk Monk). Things don’t seem to be as relaxed, cool and composed for Carti as they did on Die Lit. This new show of emotion is a plus for Carti, as his critics had always lamented at his lack of “substance”. From a different vantage view though, the sourness in his music is bitter sweet. To use the Kanye parallel once more, conflict and sadness in Kanye’s music is something we are used to because it has always been there in broad daylight for all to see. From the struggles for recognition on The College Dropout to the revelations of manic episodes on Ye. It is something we are used to. But for Carti, going from a happy-go-lucky-kid on his self-titled mixtape, albeit with similar themes of drugs and women into an angry, anarchistic and paranoid persona is a transformation that will come as a surprise, and perhaps maybe a disappointment for some of his fans.
The aggression on the first half of Red is balanced out somewhat with tracks that sit on the side of greater pop sensibility. Over produced by Art Dealer is a stadium sized melodic crooner in the vein of Long Time — Intro and Fell in Luv from Die Lit. F33l Lik3 Dyin samples Bon Iver’s Imi, slowing things down from the preceding 23 tracks to close the album out in more introspective fashion.
Whole Lotta Red is an uncompromising, sporadic and messy tour de France of experimental trap music. Like the direct comparison to Yeezus it is an intentional abrasive fuck you. But unlike Yeezus, which is trimmed of its fat to arrive at a run time of 40 minutes, Whole lotta Red runs at just over an hour. Making the existence of ‘filler’ material hard to avoid.
But after spending sometime with the album, lost in, as the cover puts it, the wonderful world of red the filler tracks start to become delightful quirks. Like the repetition on JumpOutTheHouse or the sugar rush and falsetto of Teen X, little things like that start to stick out over multiple listens.
Whole Lotta Red is a further move to the left for Playboi Carti, something I did not think was possible after Die Lit. It is a sign that the boundaries of trap music is an endless line that we still do not know of its limits. Carti with this album has stretched this boundary even further, and who knows what and who will come next for the genre.
Post Script
Last one of the year…. :) Love to the regular readers of this blog this year, I love so you so much, whether we are still friends or not.
