![]() ![]() (At times Call Me recalls In My Mind: The Prequel, the 2006 Gangsta Grillz tape by Tyler’s hero, Pharrell.) Drama is at his comedic best, goading on verses or underlining Tyler’s monologues about jet-setting (“A young lady just fed me French vanilla ice cream!”). There are times when the album evokes the grittiest of those tapes- its single reimagines a Gravediggaz song-but it breaks up the heavier cuts with shards of bright pop. It’s an inspired choice, nostalgic but irreverent, and suited perfectly to his strengths: It grants him the freedom to play with tone, to write personally or use his gravelly voice as texture, to treat the harshest raps and the most delicate hooks as mad experiments gone wrong.Ĭall Me is hosted by DJ Drama, the animated Philly native whose Gangsta Grillz series includes some of the most essential rap records of the century so far. (Think of how many times you’ve seen advertising for an artist’s “debut album” only to think, “Don’t they have three albums already?”) Call Me If You Get Lost-which is either Tyler, the Creator’s sixth or seventh album, depending on whether or not you count 2009’s Bastard-argues for the mixtape not as a tidy bit of careerist maneuvering, but as an aesthetic tradition. After the success of IGOR, Tyler took a solo joyride: “Bought another car ’cause I ain’t know how to celebrate.” A chapter-closing gift for fans, The Estate Sale is a lake house afterparty.When digital streaming platforms made it easy to profit off of online-only releases, provided the artist or label owns the rights to what’s uploaded, “mixtape” became a nominal term used cynically to signal which rap records were meant to be taken more seriously than others. The cover of The Estate Sale depicts Tyler in a similar position-gazing into the distance, suitcases in hand-though he would probably call them valises now. An estate sale insinuates the death of its owner: death of preconceived notions of success, death of ego, death of self-destructive nihilism. When I first heard Tyler associate himself with his Baudelaire persona on Call Me If You Get Lost, I didn’t think of the French poet: I thought about the orphans at the center of Lemony Snicket’s children’s novels A Series of Unfortunate Events. Constantly on the run, they’re never in one place long enough to unpack their suitcases. ![]() Twenty seconds into original album track “Massa,” a drum beat cuts Tyler off when he begins to idolize his passport. “Heaven to Me” diverts that incomplete thought with a tender ode to domesticity-date nights, water-gun fights, loved ones in the kitchen, and seeing a piece of yourself in the children you helped to bring into the world. On “Sorry Not Sorry,” he glimpses guilt and helplessness about not leveraging his status for Black liberation: “I can’t save niggas/I’m not Superman, but I could try.” On “What a Day,” he shouts out Black women, especially the ones who raised him. He brings back his love for ’80s synth-funk on “Boyfriend, Girlfriend” and taps into New Orleans bounce and Southern trap across “Dogtooth” and “Stuntman.” A$AP Rocky gushes about spoiling his lady on “Wharf Talk,” while Tyler croons with the angst of his Flower Boy and IGOR eras. The breezy and soulful “What a Day” and “Heaven to Me” bring in a John Legend sample and an unreleased Madlib deep cut to complement the album’s leisurely, jet-setting atmosphere.Īs he adjusts to the altitude, Tyler’s position as a community leader presents itself as a new source of anxiety. The stylistic adventurousness of The Estate Sale offers insight into the sounds that would become Call Me If You Get Lost. Tyler’s own biting, almost Pusha T-like inflection over the New Boyz-type beat could’ve spawned a dance trend in the early 2010s. Fellow Californian Vince Staples rides into “Stuntman” like he’s behind the wheel of a monster truck: “No, you can’t be my girl, bitch, are you dumb?” If you have beef, he suggests you duel him in Milan-if you can afford the flight, that is. As he’s evolved in his artistry, he’s replaced shock value with boasts whose imagination and precision-“I got a jelly bean, Kelly green Rolls/And the guts off-white like a jalapeño”-are almost outdone by the Goblin-like freneticism of his delivery. In his early years, Tyler could be something of an edgelord, delivering violent lyrics about sexual assault through a mischievous grin.
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