In case you haven't heard or if you're unsure of the matter, Earl Sweatshirt is easily the best lyricist in the California rap collective Odd Future and he has returned to lay down the law for all those new rappers out there, most of whom are much older than him. Shit, the kid's younger than I am at only 19 years old, and his lyrical prowess is way beyond his years. He displays heavy use of multi-sylable rhyme schemes and clever wordplay, as is evident by his absurdly epic verse on the Odd Future song "Oldie", his big return to the group on last year's OF Tape Vol. 2 after spending a year in a reform school of some sort on the island of Samoa. His time away inspired many a fan to chant "FREE EARL!" at concerts and wear Earl t-shirts and sweatshirts (how appropriate) despite Earl having only one body of work to his credit; the mixtape EARL. In short, Earl is free, and he's making it known. So far he's made appearances on other albums by his fellow Odd Future members like MellowHype, Domo Genesis, and singer Frank Ocean, and finally he's going to treat the Steve Harvey-hating masses to his second album Doris this year.
He's already dropped the single "Chum" a few months ago with its gritty drum beat and haunting piano that are reminiscent of sounds you'd find on the first Wu-Tang Clan album and, of course, anything that reminds me of that masterpiece gets at least one thumb up from me, and "Chum" gets only that one thumb, minus the second, but why? One thing that's been annoying me about Earl since he returned from Samoa is his very, very relaxed flow, in fact, sometimes he just sounds bored like on the Frank Ocean and MellowHype albums last year, which was disappointing because of how on fire he sounded on "Oldie". His lyricism, on the other hand, has matured greatly. He's graduated from the murder obsessed lyrics of his debut to more introspective and intelligent lyrical themes, and it only makes him sound more impressive when he spits those rhymes with a flow that makes your head spin. So, obviously, I became pretty fucking excited for his new album and was glued to my computer once again waiting to see his new single "Whoa" to debut on the Odd future site. I was not disappointed.
This track is fuckin' banging. I was up out of my seat moving to the music and making ridiculous wiggery arm gestures with impunity, and I didn't care. The instrumental behind this thing is classic Odd Future. You have the stuttering drums, spooky electric pianos and video game synths that are distinctive of the group's material, and that sound hasn't gotten old to me yet. Earl appropriately gets on top of this beat with more aggression than on "Chum" and he sounds impassioned and seems to want everybody to know that he is indeed back and is ready to make up for the lost time. Just listen to the rate he delivers his rhymes from 1:59 to 2:12, it will make your brain hurt listening to it, his flow is that impressive. To add to the awesome sauce brewing on this track, you also have OF leader Tyler, the Creator making an appearance. But, unfortunately, Tyler is my least favorite thing about this song. I wish the hook for this thing was more than just Tyler spelling out "golf wang", and his bullshit talking at the beginning and the end of the song annoys me. And no, I'm not just singling out Tyler for doing this, this is something that annoys me about hip-hop in general. Even my favorite Wu-Tang clan members will open up or end a track with inane shit like "Yo, uh, uh, uh, word up, uh, yeah, don't fuck wit' dis nigga, uh..." But Tyler's rhymes on here bring the heat as usual, so that's kind of a minor quibble. From listening to so much Odd Future, I think that when Earl and Tyler meet, magic just happens.
All in all, I like this new song much better than Tyler's latest and I'm much more hyped about Doris than Wolf. Earl is free, and I'm celebrating the fact every time I lose my shit to this song.
8.8/10
What do you think about Earl or Odd Future in general? Weigh in with your comments below.
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