Lil Uzi Vert — Eternal Atake: Review
Initial Thoughts on Eternal Atake
Eternal Atake starts off with the atmospheric track “Baby Pluto.” With a flow a la DaBaby, Uzi pushes his way back onto the scene that he is widely credited as being one of the creators. The piano gets a little awkward as the drums come in, but Uzi’s presence compensates with some aggressively fun verses and a hook that’ll get stuck in your head just after one listen.
That’s a bit of a theme with this project. Uzi is an absolutely fantastic hook writer.
Where this album misses, however, is in its individuality. Lil Uzi Vert is supposed to be the trapper that’s pushing this very controversial genre forward, and yet through three tracks he has recycled flows and used some great, but generic, beats. I feel like I could’ve found some of these beats in the first half of the project on YouTube, but that’s the power of Uzi. His vocal presence can carry nearly any production (see Tyler, The Creator’s fantastic track featuring Uzi, IGOR’S THEME). Besides Homecoming, which feels like a shameless Future copy-paste, Uzi, himself, doesn’t miss.
The only points where the production truly pops out as something that can hold their own weight doesn’t come until really the second half of the album, starting with the track Celebration Station. The production comes into its own in the second half of the project and really takes the quality of the so far lacking album into another level. This album turns from a generic trap, into a beautiful collage of nearly stereotypical 90s radio pop and trap music. It’s a match that’s seemingly doomed to fail, yet somehow Uzi ties these sounds together with his melodic rapping… Just like every other hit he has.
If this album didn’t feel futuristic before, the listener can surely feel it now. The ambiance created by the minimalist pop-trap production and Uzi’s fast-paced flow is always a match made in heaven, just look at Uzi’s most popular tracks prior to Eternal Atake. This can also be detrimental to the album though. As I listen for a third and fourth time, the flow on each track seems to flow together, negatively. There’s little versatility in Uzi’s lyricism and flow. This is a problem typical with trap music and something so-called “trap heads” tend to ignore when rating trap, and rightfully so. But for someone like Uzi who is a trap trailblazer, couldn’t this be where the untapped potential of trap music is? I think so, and I think that was a missed opportunity for Uzi.
Above all else though, this album though, front to back, through all of my gripes, is chock-full of future radio hits. I wouldn’t be surprised if standouts like I’m Sorry, Celebration Station, Chrome Heart Tags (produced by Chief Keef), Bust Me, Urgency, P2, and That Way all get decent radio play for their unique twist of the radio pop that defined the past, and the trap that defines modern radio music.
Urgency featuring Syd (of Odd Future/The Internet fame) is a good example of this. It’s an interesting change of pace in comparison to what we consider “typical Uzi.” It feels like a refreshing mix of R&B and trap, two genres that have mingled in the past but have never combined like this before. Syd delivers an excellent feature, well-deserving of the sole feature on this project. I just wish the whole album was like this; boundary-pushing trap, similar to Uzi’s contemporaries Playboi Carti and Young Thug. Instead, Uzi stays in his comfort zone for large portions of this project, for better or for worse, and lets the uniqueness of the second half’s production be what gives this album its unique quirk.
He can make it accepted along with the other celebrated subgenres of the diverse genre that is hip-hop, but is Eternal Atake THE answer? No. Is it AN answer? Yes. I am in no way calling this Uzi’s opus because I feel Uzi can make something so much greater than just another “good trap album,” I think he can make a classic album period. Through and through, Lil Uzi Vert delivers what his ever-growing fan base wanted and then some, but it might leave some wanting more.
Above all else though, this album though, front to back, through all of my gripes, is chock-full of future radio hits. I wouldn’t be surprised if standouts like I’m Sorry, Celebration Station, Chrome Heart Tags (produced by Chief Keef), Bust Me, Urgency, P2, and That Way all get decent radio play for their unique twist of the radio pop that defined the past, and the trap that defines modern radio music.
Initial Thoughts — 7.8/10
The most anticipated trap album EVER (yes ever) isn’t the “boom or bust” the fans and detractors expected, but rather somewhere in the middle. After two years of patient, and sometimes impatient, waiting, it surely doesn’t disappoint, but it also won’t change the minds of Uzi’s long-time naysayers.
Article Written by Ari Partrich | @ariprtrch
