It took me awhile to fully embrace Lil Uzi Vert’s
Luv Is Rage. The mixtape from the Philadelphia rapper is full of weird Atlanta-style trap songs that at its best offers some truly entertaining, fun tracks and at its worst becomes extremely generic.
Uzi is like a cross between Young Thug and Future, allowing him to take his music to places other trap rappers would not think to venture toward like the cruising “Wit My Crew X 1987” and “Nuyork Nights At 21.” And his youth filled vocals allow him to make convincing bass rattling turn-up anthems on the songs “Safe House,” “Banned From TV,” “Moist” and “Belly.” Yet no matter how impressive these tracks may be they do not have the power to hold the mixtape on their own.
Right away it becomes apparent that Lil Uzi lacks any real lyrical prowess or the ability to switch his flow up, bringing us an exhausting track like “7AM.” Without any emotional investment or exciting vocal acrobatics, the incredibly good, hopping and woozy beats start to outshine Lil Uzi Vert. The best listening of this mixtape perhaps is to experience it not as a whole but a handful of individual tracks at a time interspersed with other artists because while this project is not outright bad, it is just ordinary.
Although I am intrigued by Lil Uzi Vert’s music, I am not ready to take the leap to say his music is incredibly good (maybe hearing his music live will change that). It will be interesting to see where he goes from here.
