At least Metro weaves in the extravagance way more naturally than the wannabe Kanye albums out there (hi, Utopia and 2093). The switch from slow and moody to uptempo and flashy in a snap on “Ice Attack” is fun enough, elevated by a showstopping Future verse where he’s bragging about his diamonds and throwing words like “banoodles” out there for the hell of it. The church-bell-driven roar of “Type Shit” is a standout, and the few seconds of Future and Playboi Carti trading slurred bars as the beat fades is transcendent. Strongest are unfussy deep cuts, like “Fried (She a Vibe),” one of those eerie strip club on a weekday afternoon joints Future and Metro are masters at. Or “Ain’t No Love,” where Zaytoven’s ominous church organs and flutes show up and you start wondering why this just isn’t Beast Mode 3.
For what it’s worth, Future sounds jazzed-up, which isn’t always the case nowadays. He’s not all Seven Dwarfs wrapped into one like he once was; throw on Hndrxx and he’s pissed off, sad, feeling himself, hating himself, flexing, melting down, at the same time, all the time. Now he’s less interested in the whys, though his life remains a self-indulgent blur of drugs and sex. Refreshingly We Don’t Trust You sheds the played-out supervillain act of I Never Liked You in exchange for decently vivid kingpin bars, even if I’d rather just go fire up Astronaut Status or Streetz Calling for that.
Pivotally, despite less singing and character work, Future still nails that sleazy, sinister atmosphere that only he can pull off. For instance, on the first half of “Magic Don Juan (Princess Diana)” he sounds like he’s on day three of a bender as he spits, “Got that sniff on me, that white shit like Tom Brady.” That seediness is injected in the album intro where he’s vaguely muttering in the shadows about fake friends like he’s about to go on a Charles Bronson-style revenge mission, as it slowly becomes more clear that he’s chatting shit about Drake.
The thing that is supposed to cement We Don’t Trust You as the kind of unforgettable, zeitgeist-defining rap moment that doesn’t happen anymore are the subliminals about Future and Metro’s breakup with Drake. (College campuses in 2016 would be heartbroken.) That seems to be the motivating force behind why Future’s tongue is more venomous than usual and the album is packed with bite-sized clips of a wrathful, heelish Prodigy monologue. Other than the intro, Future leaves the real grimy work to a sourpuss appearance from Kendrick. Over Metro’s solid flip of West Coast digital funk jam “Everlasting Bass,” Kendrick throws a few warm-up jabs at Drake (and J. Cole, much less important). “Motherfuck the big three, nigga, it’s just big me,” he yells, addressing Cole’s idea that the trio are the three pillars of modern rap. A declaration of a war of words and sass. But it’s hard to let go of the fact that I would have cared so much more about this hip-hop soap opera a decade ago, the last time it would have felt deeper than bored rich guys bickering for attention and streams. The timing is off.
Daniel D`Amico for SANREMO.FM
