REVIEW: Playboi Carti - Die Lit

Die Lit is Playboi Carti's second full-length project.  It was released this past Friday, a little over a year after dropping his self-titled mixtape.  Since dropping Playboi Carti, Carti has found lots of success.  Carti was signed to A$AP Mob and became a prominent face in the New York posse.  He was featured quite a bit in A$AP Ferg's Still Striving and is featured many times throughout A$AP Mob's Cozy Tapes Vol. 2: Too Cozy.  He was one of the ten names in 2017's XXL Freshman Class and his song "Magnolia" became a huge hit, peaking at No. 29 on the Billboard Hot 100 and landing at No. 79 on the 2017 year-end chart.  Playboi Carti has attracted as many detractors as fans as he's made his way to superstardom.  Many criticisms include "he's just a walking ad-lib" or "he's a trash lyricist."  I like some of his music personally.  While I understand that his lyrical content is incredibly simplistic, he has great flows and energy as well as a stellar ear for beats.  I wasn't a fan of the songs and features he's done between his first tape and this release, but his stacked list of features was intriguing.

Positives

Carti hasn't lost a step when it comes to beat selection.  In fact, I would say some of the beat choices for this album were better than his self-titled.  He and Pi'Erre Bourne are a great rapper-producer combo, and Carti's flow fits Pi'Erre's production so well.  His flow is still on point as Carti continues to ride every beat almost flawlessly.  It's like he's cracked the code and isn't even trying.  The features didn't feel phoned in like I suspected, and I'll elaborate more on that later.

Negatives

While I consider myself a fan of Carti, I'm still gonna address his shortcomings as a rapper.  Even though he doesn't have many cringe-worthy lines, you can't deny that Carti's lyrics flat-out suck.  He'll recycle lines in many of his songs and not even try to change them.  I'm pretty sure there are two songs on here that have a part where Carti just repeats the word "lean" eight times.  His lyrics are so shallow, they would drown in a kiddie pool.  And a rapper as lyrically deficient as Playboi Carti should not be making projects that are 19 songs and just under an hour.  I get the purpose of getting those precious streams but seriously?  It's a good thing some of these features were here to keep my interest.

So how were the features?

1) Skepta (Lean 4 Real) - Skepta and Playboi Carti seemed like a weird combo, but they kinda fit together.  I still found that song to be okay at best.

Verdict: Ehhhh

2) Travis Scott (Love Hurts) - The two have collaborated before on Travis' SoundCloud loosie "Green and Purple."  While this wasn't Trav's best feature, I think his autotuned vocals rode the beat very well and are part of the reason why this song is so catchy.

Verdict: Liked

3) Lil Uzi Vert (Shoota) - Uzi and Carti are a lethal combo (Check out the song "Firearm" on YouTube if you haven't).  This song just adds to their winning streak and makes me really want 16*29.

Verdict: Liked

4) Pi'Erre Bourne (Right Now & Top) - Pi'Erre Bourne is not a good rapper.  Producers are terrible rappers in general.  Please stick to producing, Pi'Erre.

Verdict: Disliked him on both songs

5) Nicki Minaj (Poke It Out) - I found her attempt at mumble rapping to be hilariously awful.  The song dragged for too long and she just made it worse.

Verdict: Disliked

6) Bryson Tiller (Fell In Luv) - What the heck was he doing here?  Bryson Tiller's music is trap-influenced but aggressive trap rap is not his thing.  He didn't fit on here at all.

Verdict: Disliked

7) Chief Keef (Mileage) - He was pretty good here but the song itself was forgettable.

Verdict: Ehhhh

8) Gunna (No Time) - I liked the song and didn't mind Gunna on here.  Gunna still sounds like a Young Thug clone but he didn't bring the quality of the track down whatsoever.

Verdict: Somewhere in between Ehhhh and Liked

9) Red ColdHearted (Middle of the Summer) - Who is this? What was this song about again?

Verdict: Disliked

10) Young Thug (Choppa Won't Miss) - One of my favorite features and tracks.  Thugger did better than expected here.

Verdict: Liked

11) Young Nudy (RIP Fredo - Notice Me) - This track was one of my favorites.  It wasn't necessarily because of Nudy but I thought he did pretty good here.

Verdict: Liked

So how were the singles?

A lot of these songs were leaked on SoundCloud.  There weren't any official releases besides "Love Hurts" after it leaked, and that one only came out on SoundCloud and YouTube.  So basically, there weren't any official singles, just like for his last project.

Favorite Tracks

1) RIP - After a pretty bad intro, I was expecting the solo songs to be a drag.  They kinda were, but there were some unexpectedly good solo songs, like this one.  The beat caught me off guard.  Pretty good song overall.

2) Love Hurts (feat. Travis Scott) - This song is insanely repetitive, but also insanely catchy.  The beat and chorus will put you in a trance.  Carti was made for these spacey beats.

3) Foreign - Probably my favorite track on this project.  The production was easily the best on this track and this song also provides the best hook on the album.

Least Favorite Track(s)

Fell In Luv (feat. Bryson Tiller) - What a weird song.  Bryson Tiller stuck out like a sore thumb.  He clearly didn't fit on here.

Poke It Out (feat. Nicki Minaj) - Also a weird song.  I liked the instrumental, but this was another song that I thought was dragged down by a feature.  Nicki, trap music isn't really your thing.  Please don't do that again.

Conclusion

Honestly, what is there to say?  You and I both knew we were just gonna get bangin' beats and a bunch of adlibs.  If you like Carti, you'll like this, and if you don't this won't change your opinion.  We basically got an extended version of Playboi Carti, which was good, but it didn't need to be this long.

Score: 3/5

Out of Carti's two projects so far, this was easily weaker than the first.  We got some good songs on here that could rival some of Playboi Carti's bangers, but it dragged a bit too long.  I'm gonna rank this right behind the self-titled mixtape and end the review here.

This will be my last full review until we get new music this Friday.  My next post will be about songs I added to my playlist so far this year.  That should be coming very soon.