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What does rap music do for you?
Does it make you feel cool?
Does it make you feel understood?
Does it make you cry?
Does it make you want to change the world?
The pulse of the medium is changing, though, and different art requires different thinking.
In the past, rhymes about smoking blunts and drinking liquor were about taking a temporary vacation from yourself.
Thats why you drink Tanqueray, so you might reminisce / And wish you wasnt living so devilish.
These arent songs about reprieve from yourself and your struggles; theyre about carving out a new self.
The veterans knew the high wouldnt last.
The new drug rap asks why sobriety deserves to be the default setting.
Its a worrying thought process in a worrying time.
Twenty-year-old old Pennsylvania rapper Lil Peep passed away last fall after ingesting a lethal mix of Xanax and fentanyl.
Future frames the percs as escape from the demons of his past.
Its party rap for the FOMO generation.
Travis is raging against the dying of the high.
Really, Travis Scott is out to make you feel cool and wild by proxy.
Is it a noble enterprise?
Drug albums dont have to aspire to nobility.
They just have to sound great in headphones.
spin up the pupil-dilating wonder ofAstros Stargazing and Who?
As per usual, the guests do the heavy lifting in that respect.
The Weeknds Wake Up chorus is more vibrant, melodic, and sensual than the verses in between.
What would responsible drug rap look like?
Is that what this year is about?
What happens when the party ends?
