During this summer, popular rapper Tyler the Creator released his new album titled DON’T TAP THE GLASS. The album for the most part was positively received by fans and critics alike. The album is an upbeat hip-hop sound with techno and house music as well. Overall a really perfect album for the summer, however others disagreed. Saying how the album was a disappointment coming off of his last album Chromakopia in 2024. That album still had elements of rap along with R&B but it dealt with a lot more. For example, the song Like Him dealt with Tyler asking the entire song does he look like his absent father as well as also revealing that his mother was responsible for his father not being there. A question that had been wondered by fans since his song Answer in 2013. Seeing this negative response to DTTP not being as deep as his previous record made me think, why can’t artists just realize fun records?
This same situation played out with rapper Kendrick Lamar when releasing his record GNX last year. This album is hip-hop but with more West Coast style also in there. The album was a huge success due to the tour done with artist SZA as well as Lamar just being a huge name last year from the feud he had against the popular rapper Drake. Yet again though, even though this album does have a message fans wanted more of what he gave on Untitled Unmastered in 2016 and To pimp a Butterfly in 2015. Which isn’t a bad thing to want an album with a lot of story and messaging whether about the artist’s life or talking about their stance on certain issues in our world today. However, the more people disregard these albums, more fun albums that experimented with new sounds and artists on those tracks only because the album’s biggest flaw is not being “deep” enough.
Overall, I feel that artists should be allowed to release an album without people expecting the same message or deep dive as previous records might have. People should always have the expectations of their favorite artists before another album releases and know what they like hearing from said artist. However, it feels unfair to only call out there being no real messaging on an album then right said album off because it’s not “reinventing the wheel”. That argument is a very unfair position to put artists in and in the end artists should be releasing the music they enjoy putting out there. Every artist should have fun with what they create.
