{"id":1792,"date":"2025-03-31T21:27:46","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T01:27:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/?p=1792"},"modified":"2025-03-31T21:41:06","modified_gmt":"2025-04-01T01:41:06","slug":"i-am-noise-i-am-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/2025\/03\/31\/i-am-noise-i-am-music\/","title":{"rendered":"I AM MUSIC\/I AM NOISE: Judging The Auralympics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Genre: <\/strong>Trap \/ Cloud Rap \/ Emo Thug Phase Rap<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Length: <\/strong>30 tracks – 1h 16m<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Features: <\/strong>Travis Scott, The Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, Jhen\u00e9 Aiko, Skepta, Future, Lil Uzi Vert, Young Thug, Ty Dolla $ign<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Opening Statement by Trishna Chettiar<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Playboi Carti\u2019s album MUSIC<\/em>, hyped up like the second coming of Whole Lotta Red<\/em>, landed with the impact of an overcooked noodle. After years of cryptic Instagram posts, mysterious leaks, and a fanbase worshipping him like a vampire messiah, Carti finally dropped MUSIC<\/em>, and it was\u2026 definitely something. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Carti built up anticipation for this album, fans survived off literal scraps: blurry concert clips, weird vampire aesthetics, whispers of unreleased bangers, etc. Lulled by the unreal hype, people predicted MUSIC<\/em> would change the rap game forever\u2014or potentially even unlock a new dimension. Instead, we got a 30-track mess that felt like Carti recorded it all within the past 3 months. However, this drawn-out buildup remains one of the few things holding this album back from being seen as pure garbage. It was talked up for so long it became a joke, resulting in people listening to it without huge expectations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

MUSIC<\/em> completely lacks direction. There\u2019s no sense of cohesion\u2014 one track might have a blown-out, distorted beat that sounds like a car crash, while the next serves up an ambient loop with barely any vocals. Carti has always thrived on unpredictability, but this time the chaos drowns out anything inspired. He relies too much on his aesthetic and mystique rather than crafting songs that actually hit. Vampires never die\u2014but they certainly do fall off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Production-wise, it\u2019s criminal to the senses. The dreadful mixing combined with poorly balanced vocals creates an unlistenable sound. The chaotic Whole Lotta Red<\/em> at least had a vision \u2013 MUSIC<\/em> is a sporadic free-for-all consisting of a ton of different sounds just piled on top of each other. Even guest features from Kendrick and The Weeknd couldn\u2019t save it. They just made Carti\u2019s parts feel even more like background noise. Paired with incredibly vapid lyrics, Carti\u2019s signature energy and engagement falls flat. His delivery comes off as lazy and uninspired, making it a chore to listen to the tracks. This album should have been named I AM NOISE.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lowlight Tracks <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“POP OUT” – Full disclosure\u2014this song is a banger. The beat does crackle and cut randomly, but Carti\u2019s performance lands. The energy, the rhythm, the sound are all there. However, this song should never have been picked for the album intro; it functions better as the third or fourth track. \u201cPOP OUT\u201d gives the impression that the album will share its same energy and excitement, but nope.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“OPM BABI” – Pure auditory brain rot. Its dense, chaotic production clashes with all good taste. It sounds like Carti gave a newborn a soundboard and just rolled with it. Carti\u2019s off-putting voice sounds experimental in the absolute worst way. Not to mention the lyrics made zero sense. I recognize the attempt to create a heavy ring of aura around this track; it\u2019s just not the aura he was aiming for. This track had to have been a complete joke that accidentally made the final cut.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“EVIL J0RDAN” – This track\u2019s flow struggles to emerge beneath the awful production. The heavy 808s and tumultuous backdrop work against each other rather than together. The thick, overdone layers of sound distract from the core of the song. The beginning sounds like a wannabe TikTok rapper assembled a beat and sent it over to Carti. Overall, this track lacks the emotional depth a song needs. It\u2019s more about style and sound\u2014which aren\u2019t executed well here. There\u2019s no chorus, no stable beat, and no real flow.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“RATHER LIE” – sounds as though Carti got the shitty first draft of \u201cTimeless\u201d <\/em>by The Weeknd and threw the beat into a microwave. This track completely leans on effects, but not even post-production could save it. Carti and The Weeknd\u2019s signature catchy hooks have fled the scene. If you ever need a song to clear out a party, this is it. \u201cTimeless\u201d stands as living proof that, in theory, \u201cRATHER LIE\u201d could be a fantastic track, but in practice, it is boooring<\/em>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

OVERLY – Again, an absolutely garbled flow. It sounds like Carti put a leaked demo on the album INCOMPLETE. If Carti revealed he worked on this track for 5 minutes total, I would fully believe him. The beat comes in strong, but then the song just kind of.. exists? It\u2019s like waiting for a rollercoaster to drop, only for it to slowly roll back into the station. The ending cuts off abruptly. If this song was a meal, it\u2019d be a plain wheat burger with no toppings and missing a patty\u2014food only by a technicality. There was almost no effort put into it; even 20 more minutes could\u2019ve been the difference between a banger and\u2026 whatever this is. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“MOJO JOJO” – Carti takes a big risk when he tries to blend himself with Kendrick\u2019s chemistry, and he fails. Reminiscent of when Sabrina Carpenter and Chappel Roan shared the stage, they\u2019re both great artists separately, but they mix like water and oil. Kendrick and Carti try so hard to complement each other\u2019s sound, but it just doesn\u2019t work. The whole endeavor sounds like they\u2019re fighting on the track. This forced duet throws all the potential out the window in favor of an awkward group project where Kendrick scribbles his name on after it\u2019s already been finished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“CRANK” – Swamp Izzo hopped on this track and stimmed for 2 minutes. Not really, but his irritating interjections peak here.The beat has potential, but it never really goes <\/em>anywhere. This es flows over a redundant loop over and over. Carti\u2019s vocal incoherence makes you question whether he was actually rapping or just testing the mic levels. While the inscrutable lyrics worked on Tyler, the Creator\u2019s \u201cEARFQUAKE\u201d, \u201cCRANK\u201d just doesn\u2019t hit the same mark. This mid track fails to do anything interesting at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Defense by Ike Nabuife<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI make albums so people can play it. And you actually hear it \u2026 driving your car you hear another car playing it. Go to the barber shop\u2026turn the radio on, and you hear them playing it. It’s playing everywhere \u2026 Not no <\/em>mysterious shit<\/em><\/strong>, and you never hear it.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

~DJ Khaled<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If one word describes Playboi Carti\u2014for better or for worse\u2014it is mysterious. Yet, with the buffet that is 2025\u2019s MUSIC, <\/em>he smears the line between commercial and experimental to force listeners to question their preconceived notions of what the word \u201cmusic\u201d even means.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A lot of the controversy surrounding MUSIC<\/em> stems from the shroud of mystery clouding the atrocious rollout that admittedly made it difficult to know where to place expectations. In Carti\u2019s great love-bombing of December 2023, MUSIC<\/em> was heralded like Tyler, the Creator\u2019s Call Me If You Get Lost <\/em>\u2013 but rather than a Wes Anderson pastel-toned DJ Drama-hosted expedition, we were in for an underworld tour with \u2018emo thug\u2019 aesthetics guided by Swamp Izzo. A year later, he propped up MUSIC <\/em>as a flowery UTOPIA-<\/em>adjacent project with glossy futuristic pop rap production. Meanwhile, there were ghetto-punk leaks like \u201cMenage\u201d hinting at Stankonia<\/em>-level genre-blending.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While, yes, the album\u2019s muddled presentation confused many, and I have to admit that the poor sequencing of the tracklist drags on the album, fans feel too entitled to the work of creatives. Not many artists can realistically deliver on 5 years of hype. Said hype-train subtracted from Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers<\/em>, UTOPIA<\/em>, and MUSIC <\/em>(in general). This tradition likely drove Frank Ocean away from the industry. To denigrate the project based on how it levels up to an imaginary project that he never promised remains deeply unfair. Whole Lotta Red <\/em>remains critically regarded as one of the most influential albums this decade, and to expect the bisexual vamp to catch lightning in a bottle twice is a big ask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incoherent structure owes to the fact this is realistically two albums (and maybe an EP) packaged as one due to the affordances of the streaming era. Personally, I would have split this into a back-to-back release like Future\u2019s duology last year, but I recognize that this prolificness doesn\u2019t fit Carti\u2019s ADHD-coded procrastination masked as mystique. Last year, many chastised PinkPantheress\u2019 take on TikTok Music, and while I have a few oldhead values, I agree that there isn\u2019t a \u2018right way\u2019 to listen to music or curate an album (to an extent).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Highlight Tracks<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“POP OUT” – This is far from the best pick for an intro, but it recalls Ye\u2019s \u201cOn Sight\u201d as it serves as a tastebreaker, telling listeners to throw out their expectations. The industrial sound design will invigorate trained ears and disorient others, painting a frenzied scene of a wrestling cagematch inside the mouth of a mechanical shark with towering rows of buzzsaw teeth. Here, Carti even endorses women\u2019s pleasure, screaming with his Sid Vicious intonation: \u201cEat her pussy, yeah (Swerve), say my grace, yeah (Swerve)\u201d. I cosign this heavily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEVIL J0RDAN\u201d and \u201cCRANK\u201d – These two tracks embody the cultural divide shaping the discourse around this album. Both tracks exemplify that gritty OG ATL sound with supplemental energy from the loudmouthed ATL-staple DJ Swamp Izzo. The return of authentic regional music has defined the past year, and a lot of the album\u2019s biggest criticisms can be cast aside by cultural differences. Skeptics might write it off as \u201cyoungster noise\u201d or \u201cboy music\u201d, but if we give westerners a pass for not resonating with undiluted Afrobeat, we should lend people from outside Fulton County the same leeway. On that note, the sample on \u201cCRANK\u201d graciously shows love to phonk icon SpaceGhostPurrp in a time when most people associate phonk with short-form edits and slop. No matter how commercial this project is, it is still very much a cultural \u2018IYKYK\u2019 moment with a clear audience. Not everyone will get the Gucci Mane nostalgia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEVIL J0RDAN\u201d is a very unorthodox song with no chorus and a broken piano beat interrupted by Swamp Izzo chirping his name like a Pokemon. It barely adheres to typical western song structures; yet, seemingly thanks to the \u201c\u2014but it makes you float *slowed and reverbed*  (EXTRA AURA EDITION)\u201d intro, it finds crossover pop success. Regardless, calling tracks like these \u201cmusic\u201d directly challenges the eurocentric monopoly on what types of music are legitimate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overall, there\u2019s a lot to appreciate on these two brief distillations of southern identity: the seamless flow exchanges on the husky-voiced \u201cEVIL J0RDAN\u201d, the back-and-forth with the different tones of the signature deep-voice on \u201cCRANK\u201d, Swamp Izzo\u2019s slam dunk that is the final \u201cI AM THE MUSIC\u201d on the former track or his dizzying \u201cALIVE\u201d rally on the latter\u2026 Trust me, I can keep going.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“CHARGE DEM HOES A FEE” – The top-tier composition distinguishes itself here\u2014with literal gradations in the song structure. The moment Future\u2019s verse gets stale, they spice it up by tossing a guitar in the mix. The moment that<\/em> gets stale, Carti enters the spotlight. The one thing Elon Musk\u2019s DOGE actually needs to cut is the government-mandated Travis Scott features.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“GOOD CREDIT” – How many rap songs do you know have a key change to introduce the feature?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carti\u2019s macabre performance chills like a gothic monster narrating his horror story. Kendrick integrates very well into the style without sacrificing any of his own eccentricity or quality. The way he lyrically skates between Swamp Izzo\u2019s intermissions sounds so fluid over the dazzling production attributed to Cardo\u2019s strobing synths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People act like this is out of character for Kendrick, but after his outlandish performance on \u201cRange Brothers\u201d, this was inevitable. Some try to paint Kendrick Lamar as this preachy \u201cmodel minority\u201d, but songs like this serve to show his solidarity with the rest of the community. The innocuous \u201cMOJO JOJO\u201d ad-libs are fun, \u201cBACKD00R\u201d is essentially \u201cLuther\u201d\u2019s loveable ratchet cousin from the south, and \u201cGOOD CREDIT\u201d here is a sparkling banger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“OLYMPIAN” – This region of the album signals a major gear-switch. The last ten tracks smell like badussy in a good way. They have a nostalgic smell like an old childhood home. They reek of an earned sweaty stank marking an endorphin-ridden workout or excursion on a 90-degree day in Atlanta\u2019s searing heat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“OPM BABI” – With Whole Lotta Red <\/em>birthing all modern rage music, Carti had<\/em> to add a song like this to pay homage to the only literally genre-defining album this decade. This song is not really my style \u2014 especially with the overstimulating tags from Swamp Izzo \u2014 but I can admire its postmodern take on hip hop and inimitable absurdist performance. \u201cDie Lit\u201d had people calling Carti the \u201cMondrian of Rap” with its minimalism, but tracks like this lure you in with the smooth soul sample before subverting it with this maximalist chittering explosion of sound showing his range as a performer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“LIKE WEEZY” – This track makes me wish I went to school in Atlanta so I could experience this album properly. With the Rich Kidz sample, this shows off the album\u2019s thesis \u2014 an ode to cultural authenticity and flamboyant Atlanta life. If \u201cOLYMPIAN\u201d embodied endorphins, this delivers pure serotonin and sunshine. On songs like this and \u201cI CAN SEEEEEE YOU BABY BOI\u201d, it\u2019s honestly impressive how this album is simultaneously so commercial yet unique.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“HBA” – While my personal favorite of this era is the anachronistic \u201c2024\u201d, \u201cHBA\u201d is undeniably the staple track of MUSIC<\/em>. It is a haunting 3.5 minutes of Carti rapping with no guest features or\u00a0 ad-libs over a beat that makes you feel like you are being ruthlessly dragged into the vampire\u2019s lair by bloodthirsty bats. It\u2019s the aura overdose. Could do without the snares, though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MUSIC\u2019<\/em>s biggest crimes are how all over the place it is and the predictable features. If this followed GNX\u2019s <\/em>footsteps <\/em>and put a bunch of nobodies and fresh faces on the album, it\u2019d largely improve the experience. It\u2019s clearly inspired by DatPiff mixtapes, but Doechii\u2019s 2024 mixtape proves that isn\u2019t an excuse for such an uncurated listen. Length notwithstanding, I would not call this bloated. Considering the runtime, there\u2019s very little fat (skips) to cut; it\u2019s more about portion control and rationing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This definitely isn\u2019t a bold, avant-garde release like WLR <\/em>or a master class in abstract impressionism like Die Lit<\/em>, but I don\u2019t think I Am Music<\/em> wants to be. Here, Carti seizes the moment to graduate from niche cult classic icon to mainstream personality without overly compromising his abstract self-expression \u2013 and based on the current sales, he\u2019s sticking the landing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion by Trishna<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead of delivering anything groundbreaking, Carti seems more focused on making noise than creating a memorable project. The tracks, filled with recycled ideas, lazy vocal performances, and jumbled production, fail to come together cohesively. Despite the potential for innovative collaborations, the album falls back on old gimmicks. What could have been an exciting evolution of Carti\u2019s sound instead unravels into a muttered mess that fails to resonate beyond surface-level aesthetics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carti depends heavily on garbled ad-libs that often feel disconnected from the music itself, making it difficult to find any real substance. It\u2019s just nothing special. The 30 song tracklist gives you the illusion of an overstuffed collection, but it offers none of the variety one might hope for. It exposes itself as an exercise in endurance. Each song painstakingly blends into the next. Every track sounds alarmingly similar, lacking the creative spark that made Carti’s earlier work stand out. This excessive, babbling album only contributes to the feeling of noise pollution, dashing any sense of excitement that might have once existed. Carti needs to apply the maxim \u201cquality over quantity\u201d in the next project. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Playboi Carti\u2019s persona and presence remain fun and magnetic, MUSIC<\/em> honestly feels like a rushed, uninspired homework assignment that Carti forgot to complete. The level of disappointment this album offers is on par with Kanye\u2019s Vultures 2<\/em>. It falls short of expectations, leaving listeners wondering if Carti still has the creative edge that once made his music so thrilling.You would think that five years of hype would mean an extraordinary album, but instead it feels like Carti locked himself in a studio with a fog machine, a Red Bull, and zero supervision. Maybe in a few years people will convince themselves this was ahead of its time, but right now, it\u2019s just ahead of my headache. If this is the future of music, we\u2019re probably screwed. The only reason it got the amount of attention it did was because of how long it was cooking. In my opinion, it should have just stayed in the oven. MUSIC<\/em> was less Die Lit<\/em> and more Die of Disappointment<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Verdict:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trishna:<\/strong> 3.6\/10<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ike:<\/strong> 7.4\/10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Genre: Trap \/ Cloud Rap \/ Emo Thug Phase Rap Length: 30 tracks – 1h 16m Features: Travis Scott, The Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, Jhen\u00e9 Aiko, Skepta, Future, Lil Uzi Vert, Young Thug, Ty Dolla $ign Opening Statement by Trishna Chettiar Playboi Carti\u2019s album MUSIC, hyped up like the second coming of Whole Lotta Red, landed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":1793,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[27,19],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1792"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1792"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1797,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1792\/revisions\/1797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arouseosu.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}