Playboi Carti: MUSIC Album Review

Music Journalist

Benjamin Kenyon

After 1,540 days, Atlanta’s own Playboi Carti released his first album since 2020’s Whole Lotta Red, with the 30-track album MUSIC. This four-plus year album prohibition has seen Carti rise from star to full on cultural-force. The hype reached a boiling point just before MUSIC’s release after years of false promises from Carti, including a never delivered deluxe edition to Whole Lotta Red, and a never-released project teased as Narcissist. Carti’s mistruths reached such great heights over the years that fans ended up creating a website, iammusic.com, chronicling the various announcements laid out by Carti in the lead up to his newest release, unfortunately a majority of it was unfulfilled.

MUSIC’s rollout consisted of sporadically released singles, all but one not available to stream on traditional streaming services. Three of those songs appear on MUSIC, in the form of “K POP”, “EVIL J0RDAN” and “HBA”, the latter two slightly altered from the originally released versions. On top of these singles, Carti spent 2024 appearing on many smash-hit songs, including three singles that at one point in time featured in the top 10 of Billboard’s Hot 100. MUSIC is on track to debut at the number one spot on Billboard’s album chart and is also set to have all 30 of its tracks debut on the Billboard Hot 100, joining Morgan Wallen and Taylor Swift as the only artists to accomplish this feat.

Due to the sheer length of the project, there are admittedly a few lulls. MUSIC feels more like a mixtape rather than an album with a coherent sonic direction. However, the strong tracks hold their own, and the sometimes-scattershot nature of the project is not that much of a detractor.

The track list contains a star-studded feature roster, including appearances from Skepta, Jhené Aiko, The Weeknd, Young Thug, Ty Dolla $ign and multiple appearances from the likes of Travis Scott, Kendrick Lamar, Future and Lil Uzi Vert. The most guest appearances on the album belong to Atlanta DJ Swamp Izzo, who plays as host on the album, his tag featured on basically every song, many songs prominently. Swamp Izzo’s frequent appearances come off as a love letter to an Atlanta Hip-hop figurehead and mixtape culture as a whole. Carti also recruited some of the best producers working today, the album primarily produced by F1lthy, Ojivolta and Cardo, and appearances from BNYX, Mike Dean and Metro Boomin among others.

“OPM BABI”, is the album’s stand-out track, a grandiose rage-style track that feels like a culmination of his evolution up to this point. “LIKE WEEZY”, another stand-out, pays homage to hip-hop pioneer Lil Wayne as well as the roots of the Atlanta trap scene. The instrumental built around a sample of the 2010 RICH KIDZ track, “BEND OVER”. Another standout track, the closing track, “SOUTH ATLANTA BABY” tells of Carti’s rags to riches journey in his beloved Atlanta, serving as a perfect outro to MUSIC, a love letter to the city and its music scene which fostered the growth of Carti.

Carti’s critics will invariably take shots at his lyricism, but in the process conflate lyricism with songwriting. His ear for beats and ability to utilize a wide assortment of sounds from different hip-hop subgenres negates any qualms with his pen. On top of this amazing ear for beats, all over the album Carti utilizes his voice unlike many others in hip-hop today, his various deliveries and voices changing smoothly from song-to-song. When it comes to Carti’s lyrical musings, less is more.

Recommended Songs:

CRUSH (with Travis Scott)

FINE S**T

TOXIC (with Skepta)

OLYMPIAN

OPM BABI

LIKE WEEZY

OVERLY

SOUTH ATLANTA BABY