Travis Scott - UTOPIA Review
Uh oh I let the music blog die again. I wonder how that happened.
For the past few months I've spent hours toiling away on a different review for another one of my favourite albums of all time. Since that album is amazing and beautiful, it deserves a tasteful, well written review. Unfortunately, current Kai lacks both the mental space and ability to write a tasteful, eloquent review. Current Kai wants to write something dumb and shallow. Which is how we ended up here with Mr. Cactus Jack.
Enjoy I guess. Next review coming in less than 2 weeks I PROMISE.
Mainstream wise, the hype leading up to the release of UTOPIA, the fourth studio album by viral rapper Travis Scott was probably the greatest out of any album released in 2023. So, what was I doing at the time, July 28th 2023, when such an obviously monumental album was released by such an obviously monumental artist? Honestly, I'm not sure. Probably listening to the same Joji songs 100 times over. Point is I didn't listen to it, even after every rap fan on earth went crazy live reacting to the star-studded cast-list of hidden features. Fast forward almost an entire year later, and I, alone at my desk at 12 am, decided to arbitrarily give this album a try after catching a glimpse of it within the hopeless pit that is my Spotify album library. I don't exactly know what motived me to finally seek to understand what I had been missing out on for so long. 73 whole minutes of Travis Scott later, was I enlightened? I mean kinda.
You see, fundamentally, I'm not a huge Travis Scott person. Even based on the impression that I got solely from his abundance of popular features on other mainstream rap songs, the massively auto-tuned gravely vocals and overdone "IT'S LIT!!!" ad-libs just aren't really my thing. Consequently, I've never actually taken the time to sit down and actually y'know... listen to one of his albums. All this uncertainty and negativity going into UTOPIA made it all the more gratifying when the opener, HYAENA, started off this album with an explosive beat drop after a cryptic introductory vocal sample. Thank god this instrumental is not your typical Billboard friendly generic trap beat. It's the right amount experimental, rough, groovy, and hard-hitting, but most importantly fun and attention grabbing. No complaints. Travis doesn't do anything particularly crazy with his verses, but still brings a delivery psyched enough to properly ride the energy of the wild instrumental. This is great. I don't think he could've chosen a better fitting intro for one of the most anticipated albums of the last 5 years.
Carrying the momentum forward, another one of my favourite beats is found shortly after on the third song, MODERN JAM, which features some booming drums very obviously reusing the same drum loop as I Am A God by Kanye West. For half of the song, Travis is effectively hyping himself up with incredibly over the top yells of real masculine stuff like "Annihilator!", "Earthquaker!", and uhhhhh "Car breaker!" (????). I guess it's supposed to be provocative in a way that doesn't quite resonate with me, but really this is the better half of the song since on his actual verses he's rapping lines like "Way I keep the knowledge, think I'm Socrates", which I might've let slide if wasn't a few lines after "I like a bi girl on a bi-cycle"... Thankfully feature Teezo Touchdown is here to save the day, even bringing with him some pretty keys to accompany his short yet sweet melodic verse that just oozes of personality. Overall, the bouncy beat puts in a lot of work carrying the song through the entirety of its 4 minute run-time, something that we probably have credited producer Guy-Manuel, half of the legendary french duo Daft Punk, to thank for.
The following MY EYES was one of the tracks I heard the most discussion about following UTOPIA's release, with many people specifically commenting on how much it sounds like a Frank Ocean song. After actually listening to the thing, I think that comparison is somewhat absurd, but that doesn't really takeaway from the fact that this song is really really good. To be fair, adding gorgeous vocal contributions from both Justin Vernon of Bon Iver and Sampha to make a serene R&B song is kinda cheating, but Travis manages to respectably hold his own with delicate pitched-up singing that matches the sentimental instrumental.
A few songs down, MELTDOWN was the only track that I actually took the time to listen to after the album's release. I used to think that it was pretty cool and featured some cold verses until the Kendrick / Drake beef happened and Drake completely lost all his rapping credibility. It's pretty unfortunate cause this song is for all intents and purposes a mini version of 2018's chart topping SICKO MODE, still managing to provide the exact same multi-beat experimental appeal, albeit a little half-baked. Both instrumentals and Travis verses are fun and hit hard, but they just aren't good enough to make listening to Drake act fake tough for a whole minute straight worth it. What a shame.
It's okay though, cause we still have this entire album's crown jewel: the stadium banger FE!N featuring none other than everybody's favourite mumble rapper, King Carti himself. Now don't get me wrong, I've seen the concert videos of Travis Scott performing this song live 10 times in a row to an audience of thousands of hyped broccoli-headed TikTok boys. That looks kinda exciting. Unfortunately, the normal song by itself, minus all the chanting fans and Travis yelling "I'M FEINING FOR MOOOOOOOORE" halfway through, wants to be a rager anthem so bad but just falls a bit flat. The repetitive chorus is almost exhilarating the first time it drops, but quickly becomes embarrassing once you fully mentally process just how goofy it is. Playboi Carti as the star feature just kinda does his usual incoherent mumbling thing, which is a problem. My brain just hasn't decayed enough to unironically enjoy the vast majority of Carti songs. Potentially that will change within the next few years but for now, this one's not a highlight.
On the other hand, a mega hit that I am absolutely on board with is the down-tempo I KNOW ?. Eerie keys and an alternative beat create an exceedingly nocturnal, intoxicated vibe that perfectly compliments Travis' sleepy delivery and normally eye-raising lyrical mishaps. And unlike the previously discussed "FE!N FE!N FE!N FE!N FE!N FE!N FE!N", this time when he redundantly repeats the same thing over and over to make a hook it's actually very catchy and pleasant. Despite the relatively low energy of the song, something about the way the diverse selection of ad-libs are thrown in is actually done really well and adds a lot to the listening experience. In a similar way, there's many other smaller details I appreciate like the way that the fluid back-end of the second verse incoherently and abruptly switches back into the final chorus.
Sadly, after this halfway point UTOPIA loses a lot of steam and suffers from an extremely severe case of feature saturation. TOPIA TWINS is the one of the most prominent examples of this. Featuring the trending 21 Savage and a much smaller artist called Rob49, there's three different rappers contributing verses onto the same song so surely between the three of them they come up with some memorable one-liners right? Right???? I mean, 21 said "Amazon Prime, give me two days, I bet he drop" at the end of his verse and I thought that was pretty funny. That's sort of it though. Sigh. The dark trap beat is very well produced but at the same time sounds a tad generic, seemingly forgetting that most of this record's appeal hinges on progressive, cinematic production.
There's not really a lot I have to say about the rest of the second leg. CIRCUS MAXIMUS is another Kanye drum interpolation with some decent guest vocals, but overall the iconic 2013 beat is pretty under-utilized and as a result I don't find this track nearly as infectious as MODERN JAM. At this point we're almost an entire hour in and I'm starting to get tired of Travis Scott. Songs become increasingly forgettable, their only saving grace being cool features that provide just enough dopamine to keep me going. Case in point, LOST FOREVER, which is basically two rap songs haphazardly stitched together, but Westside Gunn goes so crazy on his verse that it doesn’t really end up mattering. Kid Cudi serves a similar purpose on LOOOVE. Within this section, K-POP stands out the most, just… definitely not in a good way. The up-beat tropical dancehall instrumental makes absolutely 0 sense with the album's overall musical direction and aesthetic, especially in combination with Bad Bunny. Why he couldn’t have kept this one as a single is a completely mystery to me.
Finally closing off, the last two tracks are Travis' best attempt at giving listeners a memorable ending to his hip-hop movie. The atmospheric TELEKINESIS, featuring SZA and Future sounds like a surefire hit on paper. A lot of this potential is definitely realized through SZA's verse on the back half of the song which is an undeniably show-stopping performance paired with an equally climactic synth rush. Unfortunately, on the front half Future doesn't really do as much on his end as I would've expected and the rest of the 4-ish minute build-up is incredibly repetitive and bloated. TIL FURTHER NOTICE manages to stick with me a lot more. There's a certain haunting serenity found in James Blake's beautiful vocals that just pairs perfectly with Metro Boomin's killer trap production. Another 21 Savage feature is an interesting choice for an album conclusion like this, but his introspective verse fits into the vibe surprisingly well. The album doesn't manage to end as good as it started, but it certainly saves a lot of face.
Overall, I honestly enjoyed UTOPIA a lot more than I thought I would. Some internal part of me wants to dislike it because of all the diehard Travis fans preaching it's glory as if it was the actual bible, but there's just so many creative song ideas and instrumental highlights that I have to give him credit for. Just don’t pay attention to the lyrics too much, I didn’t really touch on them much throughout this review for good reason. Sometimes they're ridiculous enough to make me laugh ("I'm loyal b***h, I got Ye over Biden" on the appropriately named SKITZO), sometimes they’re just not good. I think if this album was in a foreign language I didn't understand I could give it a whole entire point higher.
Yes, it's also at least 2 or 3 songs too long. And yes, middle-aged Pitchfork RYM bald guys will call it an uninspired trap version of Yeezus, but the fact is that Travis actually created something that made me feel something with all the cool sounds he presented here, even if most of the time the only word I can conjure to describe that feeling is "vibes". Objectively this is one of the best produced rap albums of recent memory, it just often benefits from you turning your own brain off while listening to it. But hey, there’s a beauty in that too.
UTOPIA / Travis Scott / Experimental Hip-Hop, Trap
Final score: 7/10
Favourite Tracks: HYAENA, THANK GOD, MODERN JAM, MY EYES, I KNOW ?, LOST FOREVER, TIL FURTHER NOTICE
Least Favourite Track: TOPIA TWINS, K-POP
Thanks for reading one of my posts!
I’m pretty new to this whole blogging thing, so if you have any feedback, criticisms, questions, or suggestions for what I should review next, I heavily encourage you to leave a comment.
so true kai zhang