Review Summary: Splashdown
Kid Cudi's influence in the realms of modern rap music is far from inconsequential, particularly amongst the newer school of artists. It’s increasingly easy to forget this fact in light of his consistently slipping quality in the years following the initial Man On The Moon albums, but there was a great deal of creativity in his most well-known, albeit overplayed hits. The sad fact is, with the greater emphasis on psychedelic tropes and courting pop sensibility, Cudi has lost his identity somewhat. It’s not that he is incapable of making a good album; he’s done so multiple times. He even managed to resurrect this ability for MotM III in 2020 after a particularly poor set of releases. It’s purely that in attempting to distil what makes his style unique and running with a great deal of his less distinctive stylistics, he’s lost the most engaging aspects of sound. This effort, Insano, is unfortunately another example of this all-too common musical pitfall- perhaps the most garish example since THAT album that we will not mention. Even over Entergalactic, which, despite being bloated and underwhelming, benefitted from its overblown sense of multimedia bombast. By comparison, Insano is a repetitive slog with only occasional glimpses of what made Kid Cudi so compelling just a few years ago.
The issue is evident from the opening moments, with the introductory slew of tracks a vaguely diverting representation of the collection to follow. ‘Vaguely diverting’ is an assessment in relation to certain elements: the chopped vocal bytes on ‘Often, I Have These Dreamz’, the throbbing bass of ‘Keep Bouncin'’, the deep, warped beat of ‘Most Ain’t Dennis’. These facets all provide flashes of Cudi’s distinctive hip hop character, with the latter example capturing the ebbing sense of cool that made his earlier, prime cuts genuinely shine. The sad fact is, though consistent throughout the release, these aspects are all background flavours. When paired with the generic lyricism, the ill-fitting flows, the ceaseless repetition… none of it gels. Travis Scott feature ‘Get Off Me’ cements this blandness with the inclusion of Scott’s trademark autotune ostentatiousness. Add into that an already monotonous beat and it becomes a shining example of piling musical novelty on top of musical novelty. Hat on a hat indeed. ‘Wow’ with A$AP Rocky and ‘ElectroWaveBaby’ represent comparative standouts from this early selection; ‘Wow’ isn’t a great song by any means but it has a catchy, hazy beat that is certainly bearable. Rocky's inclusion here certainly doesn't hurt and lends some much-needed character to the proceedings. Similarly, the retro stylistic of ‘ElectroWaveBaby’ has a halfway decent RnB groove, but, much like the rest of the release, feels very underwritten.
The mid-point to tail-end of this unnecessarily long album manages to settle into more of a groove than the initial run, but nowhere does Cudi elevate himself to a standard resembling the quality of his golden era. ‘Cud Life’ makes use of dissonant strings that pepper the melody of the beat throughout, and, though bizarre, it does work, in an experimental way. Unfortunately, though, the experimentation doesn’t fit cohesively with Cudi’s flow or the clean singing in the main body of the track. ‘Mr. Coola’, probably Insano’s most enjoyable moment, is an entertaining banger with slick production- but again, it feels very bland and par for the course. Follow-up cut ‘Freshie’, in spite of its weak lyrical content, is a downtempo and synth-heavy slice of hip hop that feels appropriately nasty against the tapestry of the album. The next handful of tracks though, ‘Tortured’, ‘X & Cud’ (with XXXTENTACION) and ‘Seven’ (with Lil Wayne) are exceptionally boring. Of the final handful after these, the album does elevate ever so slightly and offers a decent selection of closers. Single release ‘Porsche Topless’ is undoubtedly the best track on the album, with a cool, funky beat and a catchy vocal hook. It’s still a far cry from Cudi’s potential, but it’s leagues better than its successor - the shameless Tame Impala knockoff ‘Blue Sky’.
Those who were following Cudi’s trajectory before this album’s release probably won’t be too surprised by the eventual outcome. In many ways it’s something of a culmination of his previous subpar albums, and represents a very middling point for the rapper’s career. There hasn’t been too much of a stylistic shift to speak of, but there is a clear lack of dynamism and inspiration here, which mostly manifests as overlong, overly repetitive, underwritten psychedelic pop rap with a heavy RnB leaning. It’s almost worth listening to for the brief moments that Cudi’s distinctive hip-hop individuality comes to the fore; these flashes of character really give the album its only appeal. Lamentably, linking these moments together is a bland hodgepodge of flatline typicality that only diverts for minutes at a time, if at all. Cudi needs to create finesse and energy within these tracks, both lyrically and musically, as if one of these aspects was polished to a higher degree it would elevate the standard of this release to no end. It's perhaps a dangerous precedent, but Kanye's production efforts on Cudi's previous work has almost always resulted in genuinely good hip hop that captures Cudi's rap persona heart-and-soul. Whether he needs a producer with an understanding of what he's shooting for in his corner or not, Cudi needs to get a handle on his own vision before he loses the character that makes him so unique. Whatever the case for the future may be- Cudi’s so much better than what's on display here. He just needs to prove it again.
