Welcome to the first edition of 'New Music Friday'! With this series, I'll be looking to review, as it says in the title, new music every Friday. As the 'streaming week' starts on a Friday, this is why most hip-hop artists tend to release on a Friday morning at 12am, so as to take advantage and gain as many streams as possible within the entire week at their disposal, so as to raise their chances of making their way up the Billboard charts. As such, with each Friday, provided we keep getting new music, I'll be reviewing it - whether it be just a single or an entire album, mixtape or EP. The selection of music that I'll review will just be random, and I'll go for the track/project that I feel I can write best about - and remember, this is all my own opinion - it's subjective.
My review style for projects will be fairly simple. I'm going to do it track-by-track with a brief paragraph on how I feel about the song, and what I think works, and what doesn't, followed by an overall rating for the track out of ten. Bear in mind, the 1-10 system is subjective for the style of hip-hop that we're looking at, so a Lil Pump track that I may rate 8/10 is an 8/10 in terms of his standards, and not an 8/10 compared to Notorious B.I.G.'s 'Juicy'.
And so, I've chosen my first review to be Smokepurpp's new project Lost Planet. First teased by Purpp back in March, this short, eight-track EP serves basically as filler material for his fans until the highly anticipated release of his debut album Deadstar 2, which is a follow-up to his 2017 debut commercial mixtape Deadstar. With features from Gunna, Lil Pump and 16-year-old NLE Choppa, expectations for this EP are fairly high, and with Purpp seemingly looking to embrace a more diverse style, we'll be going into this review with an open mind.
Without further ado, let's get into it.
Baguettes (feat. Gunna) - Doesn't offer too much. Very familiar generic 'trap' beat, with fairly lacklustre lyrics. Gunna feature seems to be a staple on almost every album nowadays, even though I don't really understand why. Gunna doesn't offer anything different from his usual incomprehensible murmuring. 4.5/10
Double (feat. NLE Choppa) - Classic Smokepurpp song, featuring the usual simple but hilarious entendres in his lyrics that he and Lil Pump became famous for - somewhat reminiscent of his style used in Deadstar. The beat was very interesting, produced by Ronny J, who as always, came through with a lively backing track. Not entirely sure it fitted the style that Purpp and Choppa were going for in this song though. Not going to lie, I wasn't actually sure who NLE Choppa was at first, but he complimented Purpp on this song excellently, with an aggressive but exciting delivery. 7/10
Chandelier (feat. Lil Pump) - Ah yes, the traditional song with Lil Pump. This pair seem to always have at least one song with each other on their respective albums/mixtapes. Content-wise, this song was not really any different to their collaborations in the past. Simple lyrics, laced with references to high fashion, drugs and many women with questionable motives. Smokepurpp delivered simple lines with not much difference to the previous two tracks, which is a bit disappointing, considering how hyped-up previous tracks between the pair have been ('Nephew' back in 2018, 'Broke My Wrist' way back in 2016, and 'ION' from Lil Pump's Harverd Dropout album earlier this year). Even Lil Pump sounded a bit off in this track - somewhat higher pitched and nowhere near as loud and obnoxious with his delivery as we know he can be. 6/10
Weapon - Another fairly standard Smokepurpp track. A bass-heavy backing track that new-age Florida natives like Purpp, Pump and XXXTENTACION became famous for helps Purpp along in this track because it gets very repetitive. It is catchy though, but however harsh it may sound, I'm glad it didn't exceed the 1minute 53 seconds that it was on for. Just another song that will get lost in the archives of Purpp's music in my opinion. 5/10
Throw Away - Purpp utilises autotune heavily in this track, in a style that I feel he is trying very hard to replicate Travis Scott or NAV with. Even the adlibs sound suspiciously Travis-like. If there's one man that I don't think you should be trying to sound like though, it's NAV. It's a decent attempt at a parody of La Flame, but again, it is a bit generic and just sounds like much of the content coming out of hip-hop at the moment though. As much as I admire Purpp's attempt to try and move away from his classic style, I just don't think this kind of autotune rap works for him. 6/10
3-8 Hot - Definitely one of the most interesting tracks on this project, Purpp seems to both stick to, and divert away, from his typical style in one song. It starts off quiet and slow, with brief teases of aggressiveness, and it's an interesting choice of backing track, featuring a piano in the background, instead of the insane bass and heavy 808's that we know Purpp usually loves. However, it works very well, and I'd rate it as one of the better tracks on the EP. My biggest criticism would be that it is disappointingly short though, and I feel Purpp could still have done a lot more with this track overall, had it been perhaps three minutes or so. Still, 7.5/10
Repeat - The loudest track on the album, this draws comparisons to a certain Comethazine or even Tay-K perhaps. Letting you know exactly how this track is gonna turn out from the very start, Purpp starts out loud and brash, and keeps that style up for all two minutes of the song. There is interludes where he calms down, but it's not for very long. The backing track, by Kenny Beats, bounces all over the place, and suits the lively, hyped-up style that Purpp aims for with this song. The lyrics are delivered fairly quickly and the metaphors and references within them are typically simple and questionable, but hilarious (one of my favourites being "like a MacBook, n***** get flipped") Overall, a good track though, and one of my favourites from the project. 7.5/10
Remember Me - The first single dropped from this project. As unpopular as this opinion may be, this is by far my favourite track from Lost Planet. Featuring a very different style to the Smokepurpp that we're used to. Utilising a melodic, chilled-out style reminiscent of The Weeknd, this track proves that Purpp can be diverse when he chooses to. Hypocritical of me yes, as I feel that Purpp thrives best when he sticks to bass-heavy, stereotypical Florida tracks, but I admire what he's gone for here and I feel he pulls it off. The backing track is slow and almost mysterious, but still features the familiar hi-hats and very casual bass drops, and it compliments his drowsy reciting of the lyrics excellently. A lot of people didn't seem to be too impressed with this track from the comment sections on YouTube etc., but I disagree. 8/10
In conclusion, I think it's fair to say the Lost Planet is bang average, and fairly standard for Smokepurpp. He does experiment throughout the project with different styles, and clearly draws inspiration from other artists, like Travis Scott and Comethazine. Smokepurpp seems to be bad for this, and has gained something of a reputation for 'biting' other artists styles. Whether this is with good or bad intentions is up for debate, but I don't think all of it works either way. The song with Gunna is boring, and the autotune in 'Throw Away' just doesn't suit Purpp in my opinion. However, there are some redeeming tracks, with 'Remember Me' being an example of Purpp's experimentation going right, and the familiarity of the style on 'Repeat' being a comfort factor. for long-time fans of him.
Overall though, I'm going to give Lost Planet a 6.5/10. It's an average EP, and I do acknowledge that it's really just a project to tide fans over until the release of the long-anticipated and long-delayed Deadstar 2. Either way, I hope Smokepurpp does carry some of this experimentation into Deadstar 2, but remembers to stick to his roots when necessary. I'm already looking forward to reviewing it.
Lost Planet by Smokepurpp, as of writing, is available now on Apple Music. Individual tracks are also available on Smokepurpp's YouTube account.
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