Rae Sremmurd - SremmLife 2

Well, I didn't dislike this. I did not expect that.

Admittedly, I didn't listen to their first album, because from the three singles I heard from it, I thought that it would be a pretty safe bet that the album would be horrible. After all, it just sounded like a couple of kids unconvincingly trying to flex like their rap heroes, and their vocal delivery sounded absolutely awful against boring production.

So, it came as a very big surprise to me when I ended up liking "Black Beatles" after a few listens. I will say that I'm not the biggest fan of The Beatles, so this kind of troll-rapping was right up my alley, and it sounded like they had taken their brag game up a level.

Across the whole album, though, there is so much awful shit, particularly recycled and cringeworthy cliches that bobs up its head pretty often, but then again, I shouldn't have been expecting a whole album without it.

This is quite a shame, because there are quite a few brag tracks that really hit the spot for me, particularly the irresistible middle section of the album.

It even sounds like Mike-Will-Made-It has stepped up his production game another level, and that really adds the album some extra layers which it otherwise would not have had, and allows Rae Sremmurd to grow artistically, and hopefully explore their sound further.

Their vocals still tread a fine line between enthusiastic and irritating though, but I think that will always be an issue with these guys.

Look, their worst is still really as bad as it gets in hip hop music (which explains why I put more than one track in my LEAST FAVS - I always try to put only one, but I couldn't decide, so both my worst are being written down), but it isn't anywhere nearly as bad as it could have been, and there were even a few tracks I enjoyed a fair bit, so kudos to improvement.

FAV TRACKS: BLACK BEATLES, SET THE ROOF, SHAKE IT FAST, LOOK ALIVE, DO YOGA

LEAST FAV TRACKS: START A PARTY, OVER HERE

5/10