Lil Uzi Vert is having an identification disaster. Their final yr or so has been spent simply spinning the wheel and praying they land on a jackpot. In 2023, there was Pink Tape, an album I generally mistake as a false reminiscence implant, like Arnold’s marriage in Whole Recall. However no, Uzi actually sang over Deftones-ish nu-metal and rapped on a flip of Shinsuke Nakamura’s WWE theme track and did a dumpster hearth cowl of System of a Down’s “Chop Suey!” That experiment in the end fell flat however the venture has its moments—the anguished scream in the beginning of “Spin Once more”; the vulnerability of “Rehab.” There was additionally the long-teased mixtape Barter 16, Uzi’s purported all-out Younger Thug cosplay, which was supposedly scrapped (I nonetheless type of need to hear the total factor). Now, with Everlasting Atake 2, Uzi’s subsequent spin lands on a retreat into their very own previous, and an entire lot of fan service.
In a current sit-down with Complicated, Uzi revealed the fan reactions they like their music to get: “50/50…I don’t like when everybody says it’s good. I really feel prefer it’s going to die out quick.” Then, on Everlasting Atake 2’s “Goddard Music”—named after their robotic canine, in fact—the observe opens with a clip from a decade-old Kitty interview the place she tries to brush the web critics off by saying, “If you place it on the web, somebody’s gonna hate it, like, it doesn’t matter what…But it surely’s superb, like, I get to have enjoyable…So I don’t care, they’re on the web, doesn’t matter.” Uzi’s message appears to be: They positively don’t care in any respect for those who hate EA2. Really, you’re supposed to hate it. This appears to be their self-defense mode after Pink Tape was shit on even by the diehards of their subreddit, as a result of for those who hearken to EA2 it looks as if the aim isn’t for the album to be divisive and even cherished—only for it to not be hated.
All of the containers are checked. Field 1: For the followers extremely nostalgic for the moody melodies of the LUV Is Rage collection. On the intro “We Good,” which properly interpolates a pattern of Alvvays’ “Very On-line Man,” Uzi’s hybrid of pop-punk shrieks and zigzagging flows goal to carry you again to the times of “XO Tour Lif3.” Besides it’s not almost as heartfelt as their older songs, which managed to be melancholic and euphoric on the identical time. It feels copy and pasted from that period, solely now they’re rapping about Galaxy Gasoline. “The Rush”—with an intro from the Nickelodeon boy band Huge Time Rush that sounds prefer it was bought on Cameo—suits the factors, too, as Uzi lifelessly runs by all their signature ad-libs (“Huh?”,“Yeah!”) like an previous wrestler who pops up at SummerSlam to say their catchphrase.
