So as you guys know by now, Joyner Lucas just dropped his newest song, I Love from his upcoming
ADHD album.
The reception has been mostly positive, but there’s something that’s very noticeable
if you look at the YouTube comments for the song, and that is people claiming that Joyner
is selling out and imitating a mainstream sound with this track.
Today we’re gonna have a quick look at why people are saying that, and what I think.
So with that being said, this is CDTV and let’s have a quick talk about this situation.
Why People Think He’s Selling Out:
Let’s start by talking about why people are upset before I give my own thoughts.
So clearly some people feel like Joyner was moving away from his roots with this song.
So why is that?
Well let’s start with one the main things I see people pointing out; the autotune on
Joyner’s voice during the hook.
There’s still many people who view autotune as a quote on quote “mumble rap” exclusive
vocal effect, so as you can imagine, some people weren’t so happy with Joyner’s
unflinching use of it here.
Some people legitimately said this is him turning into a mumble rapper in the comments.
Then there’s the lyrics.
I wouldn’t say this track is lyrically basic, but people have pointed to the repetitive
hook and materialistic nature of the verses as something to criticise Joyner for.
Finally, I’ve seen a lot of comments on his flow being uninspired on this track, and
even people saying that he’s biting from other artists or that it sounds too typical.
A lot of people mentioned the fact that it contained a slower flow with fairly big gaps
between the lines.
This isn’t really what Joyner is known for, so some people reacted negatively towards
it.
So, these 3 reasons listed above are the main arguments I’ve seen as to how Joyner is
selling out or becoming a mumble rapper.
So are these arguments valid?
Is He Selling Out?:
No, he absolutely isn’t.
The question that’s in the title?
Yeah that’s a dumb question and I don’t think anyone should be asking it at this stage.
Just consider what this is, it’s the lead single from Joyner’s major label debut album,
so it’s only logical that it would have at least a bit more commercial appeal than
most of his tracks do.
He wants this to get out there, he wants this to appeal to a lot of people and promote the
album, that’s not selling out as long as he’s still bringing some passion and talent
to his music, and he’s definitely still doing that.
And here’s the biggest key factor to keep in mind; this is one song.
It’s very unlikely that this is representative of what his albums general focus and direction
is gonna be like.
Obviously I can’t say that with complete certainty, but I’d be willing to bet that
there’s still a whole lot of content and storytelling packed into his upcoming album,
and this was just released to be a low key banger about Joyner’s success to draw in
some more ears.
You lure them in with the hits, then you hit them with the depth.
The funny thing is, ive watched this exact same thing happen to Hopsin.
I’ve followed his career since around 2012, and as his music started to become more polished
and professional, you could see more and more fans bashing him for incorporating things
like trap beats into his songs.
It just seems when you build this underground rap fanbase initially, certain fans can have
this closed minded approach where anything that utilises autotune or a more mainstream
sounding beat is trash mumble rap music to them.
It’s just weird seeing the exact same thing happen to Joyner, especially when Joyner is
no stranger to making songs like this.
And that is important to note, some of his old music does sound like this, this isn’t
anything super new for him.
Listen to Riding Solo which he dropped in 2014.
Massive presence of autotune on the hook, mostly slow flows with long pauses between
the lines, hard beat, it’s very similar to this song in many ways.
What I’m tryna say is, it’s not like Joyner is new to this sound, he’s made turn up
style music before.
Sure, the lyrics are a bit simpler here, but does every song really need to contain insane
bars and wordplay?
I personally don’t think so.
Of course I’m not saying you have to like the song, you can hate it if that’s how
you truly feel, but to specifically say this is him turning his back on the fans that helped
him get to where he is?
That’s the part that’s just false in my opinion.
Sure, if the album is packed with more simplistic tracks like this, then I’ll be much more
worried, but Joyner dropping one song like this is simply NOT him selling out.
(Outro)