lil yachty album cover new

Lil Yachty Reveals AI-Generated Album Cover for ‘Let’s Start Here,’ Depicting Demented Boardroom of Executives

By Yousef Srour

Yousef Srour

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Lil Yachty has revealed the artwork and release date for his forthcoming album, “Let’s Start Here,” set to debut Jan. 27 on Quality Control Music and Motown Records.

Ever the provocateur, the rapper’s new cover art previews an AI-generated image of what seems to be seven executives sitting next to each other in suits. With malformed faces akin to a psychedelic trip down the rabbit hole, the artwork seems unremarkable upon first glance. However, the longer you stare at their faces, they look inhuman, with contorted facial features and warped smiles.

The post is captioned : “Let’s Start Here. – 1/27  Chapter 2. Thank You for the patience,” hinting at a potential redux of an already teased album, collectively referred to as “Sonic Ranch.” On Dec. 25, Yachty’s latest album was leaked by Leaked.cx, much to the Michigan rapper’s disappointment. He took to Twitter later that day to post a half-hearted sad-face emoji to express anguish in the untimely launch of a potentially seminal work within his discography.

In an interview with Icebox last year , the “ Minnesota ” rapper has expressed that his “new album is a non-rap album,” hence the second chapter that he alludes to in his Instagram post. Yachty explains: “It’s alternative, it’s sick!” After recently collaborating with artists such as Tame Impala, he’s been in the process of creating a “psychedelic alternative project… [with] all live instrumentation.”

Slowly shedding major label support, Yachty now has his own label and creative consultant company, Concrete Records and Concrete Family, respectively. Working closely with Concrete Family, Yachty teamed up with the General Mills cereal brand in 2020 for a limited collaboration with Reese’s Puffs and has an undisclosed sneaker set to be released at a later date. Similar to his 2021 mixtape, “Michigan Boat Boy,” which featured almost solely Detroit artists including Rio Da Yung OG and Babyface Ray, Yachty plans to also release a mixtape with the Concrete Boys collective sometime this year.

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Lil yachty shares ai-generated ‘let’s start here’ album cover.

'Let's Start Here' is set to release on Jan. 27.

By Armon Sadler

Armon Sadler

Hip-Hop Reporter

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Lil Yachty is gearing up for the release of his next album, Let’s Start Here , and like much of his career, he’s doing things unconventionally. The 25-year-old shared the cover art earlier this week, which was generated through artificial intelligence.

Let’s start here. 1/27. LP. Thank You 4 Your Patience friends. pic.twitter.com/sI1PK0ws3z — C.V Thomas (@lilyachty) January 17, 2023

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“It’s the first time I’m actually speaking on it. It’s a non-rap album,” Lil Boat said. “It’s alternative. It’s sick.” His October 2022 single “ Poland ,” which generated a heavy buzz after leaking online before its official release and subsequent video, displayed the different sounds Yachty was exploring.

Last week, the “Minnesota” rapper put a call out for an all-women band in now-deleted Instagram and Twitter posts. It is unclear whether the tryouts, originally set for Jan. 12 in Lithonia, GA, actually took place and whether the band was meant to contribute to Let’s Start Here or accompany him on tour.

Lil Yachty is riding a wave of momentum after receiving high praise for his contributions to Drake and 21 Savage’s November 2022 collaborative project Her Loss . He had production credits on “BackOutsideBoyz,” “Privileged Rappers,” “Pu**y & Millions,” and “ Jumbotron Sh*t Poppin ,” the last of which the Toronto rapper shared a music video for this week.

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Let’s Start Here.

By Alphonse Pierre

Quality Control / Motown

February 1, 2023

At a surprise listening event last Thursday,  Lil Yachty   introduced his new album  Let’s Start Here. , an unexpected pivot, with a few words every rap fan will find familiar: “I really wanted to be taken seriously as an artist, not just some SoundCloud rapper or some mumble rapper.” This is the speech rappers are obligated to give when it comes time for the drum loop to take a backseat to guitars, for the rapping to be muted in favor of singing, for the ad-libs to give it up to the background singers, and for a brigade of white producers with plaque-lined walls to be invited into the fold. 

Rap fans, including myself, don’t want to hear it, but the reality is that in large slices of music and pop culture, “rapper” is thrown around with salt on the tongue. Pop culture is powerfully influenced by hip-hop, that is until the rappers get too close and the hands reach for the pearls. If anything, the 25-year-old Yachty—as one of the few rappers of his generation able to walk through the front door anyway because of his typically Gushers-sweet sound and innocently youthful beaded braid look—might be the wrong messenger. 

What’s sour about Yachty’s statement isn’t the idea that he wants to be taken seriously as an artist, but the question of  who  he wants to be taken seriously by. When Yachty first got on, a certain corner of rap fandom saw his marble-mouthed enunciation and unwillingness to drool over hip-hop history as symbols of what was ruining the genre they claimed to love. A few artists more beholden to tradition did some finger-wagging— Pete Rock and  Joe Budden ,  Vic Mensa and  Anderson .Paak , subliminals from  Kendrick and  Cole —but that was years ago, and by now they’ve found new targets. These days, Yachty is respected just fine within rap. If he weren’t, his year-long rebirth in the Michigan rap scene, which resulted in the good-not-great  Michigan Boy Boat , would have been viewed solely as a cynical attempt to boost his rap bona fides. His immersion there felt earnest, though, like he was proving to himself that he could hang. 

The respect Yachty is chasing on  Let’s Start Here. feels institutional. It’s for the voting committees, for the suits; for  Questlove to shout him out as  the future , for Ebro to invite him  back on his radio show and say  My bad, you’re dope.  Never mind if you thought Lil Yachty was dope to start with: The goal of this album is to go beyond all expectations and rules for rappers.

And the big pivot is… a highly manicured and expensive blend of  Tame Impala -style psych-rock, A24 synth-pop, loungey R&B, and  Silk Sonic -esque funk, a sound so immediately appealing that it doesn’t feel experimental at all. In 2020, Yachty’s generational peers,  Lil Uzi Vert and  Playboi Carti , released  Eternal Atake and  Whole Lotta Red : albums that pushed forward pre-existing sounds to the point of inimitability, showcases not only for the artists’ raps but their conceptual visions. Yachty, meanwhile, is working within a template that is already well-defined and commercially successful. This is what the monologue was for? 

To Yachty’s credit, he gives the standout performance on a crowded project. It’s the same gift for versatility that’s made him a singular rapper: He bounces from style to style without losing his individuality. A less interesting artist would have been made anonymous by the polished sounds of producers like  Chairlift ’s Patrick Wimberly,  Unknown Mortal Orchestra ’s Jacob Portrait, and pop songwriters Justin and Jeremiah Raisen, or had their voice warped by writing credits that bring together  Mac DeMarco ,  Alex G , and, uh,  Tory Lanez . The production always leans more indulgent than thrilling, more scattershot than conceptual. But Yachty himself hangs onto the ideas he’s been struggling to articulate since 2017’s  Teenage Emotions : loneliness, heartbreak, overcoming failure. He’s still not a strong enough writer to nail them, and none of the professionals collecting checks in the credits seem to have been much help, but his immensely expressive vocals make up for it. 

Actually, for all the commotion about the genre jump on this project, the real draw is the ways in which Yachty uses Auto-Tune and other vocal effects as tools to unlock not just sounds but emotion. Building off the vocal wrinkle introduced on last year’s viral moment “ Poland ,” where he sounds like he’s cooing through a ceiling fan, the highlights on  Let’s Start Here. stretch his voice in unusual directions. The vocals in the background of his wistful hook on “pRETTy” sound like he’s trying to harmonize while getting a deep-tissue massage. His shrill melodies on “paint THE sky” could have grooved with  the Weeknd on  Dawn FM . The opening warble of “running out of time” is like Yachty’s imitation of  Bruno Mars imitating  James Brown , and the way he can’t quite restrain his screechiness enough to flawlessly copy it is what makes it original.

Too bad everything surrounding his unpredictable and adventurous vocal detours is so conventional. Instrumental moments that feel like they’re supposed to be weird and psychedelic—the hard rock guitar riff that coasts to a blissful finale in “the BLACK seminole.” or the slow build of “REACH THE SUNSHINE.”—come off like half-measures.  Diana Gordon ’s falsetto-led funk on “drive ME crazy!” reaches for a superhuman register, but other guest appearances, like  Fousheé ’s clipped lilts on “pRETTy” and  Daniel Caesar ’s faded howls on the outro, are forgettable. None of it is ever  bad : The synths on “sAy sOMETHINg” shimmer; the drawn-out intro and outro of “WE SAW THE SUN!” set the lost, trippy mood they’re supposed to; “THE zone~” blooms over and over again, underlined by  Justine Skye ’s sweet and unhurried melodies. It’s all so easy to digest, so pitch-perfect, so safe.  Let’s Start Here. clearly and badly wants to be hanging up on those dorm room walls with  Currents and  Blonde and  IGOR . It might just work, too. 

Instead, consider this album a reminder of how limitless rap can be. We’re so eager for the future of the genre to arrive that current sounds are viewed as restricting and lesser. But rap is everything you can imagine. I’m thinking about “Poland,” a song stranger than anything here: straight-up 1:23 of chaos, as inventive as it is fun. I took that track as seriously as anything I heard last year because it latches onto a simple rap melody and pushes it to the brink. Soon enough, another rapper will hear that and take it in another direction, then another will do the same. That’s how you really get to the future. 

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Lil Yachty Ready to Get Going With New Album ‘Let’s Start Here’

• By Jon Blistein

Jon Blistein

Lil Yachty appears ready to release his first new album in three years later this month. 

On social media Tuesday, Jan. 17, the rapper shared what was ostensibly the weird-as-hell cover art for his next LP — a surreal image of a group of besuited adults sporting some deranged smiles — along with the title and release date: Let’s Start Here out Jan. 27. 

Lil Yachty then cryptically added, “Chapter 2,” before thanking fans “for the patience.”

View this post on Instagram A post shared by C.V T (@lilyachty)

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“I met Andrew from MGMT, and I’ve been talking to a bunch of people. I met Kevin Parker [of Tame Impala], I’ve been talking to him. It’s just inspiring,” he said. “I got a bunch of side projects I’m going to drop before my next album. But what I’m trying to do on my next album, I’m trying to really take it there sonically.”

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How Lil Yachty Ended Up at His Excellent New Psychedelic Album Let's Start Here

By Brady Brickner-Wood

The evening before Lil Yachty released his fifth studio album,  Let’s Start Here,  he  gathered an IMAX theater’s worth of his fans and famous friends at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City and made something clear: He wanted to be taken seriously. Not just as a “Soundcloud rapper, not some mumble rapper, not some guy that just made one hit,” he told the crowd before pressing play on his album. “I wanted to be taken serious because music is everything to me.” 

There’s a spotty history of rappers making dramatic stylistic pivots, a history Yachty now joins with  Let’s Start Here,  a funk-flecked psychedelic rock album. But unlike other notable rap-to-rock faceplants—Kid Cudi’s  Speedin’ Bullet 2 Heaven  comes to mind, as does Lil Wayne’s  Rebirth —the record avoids hackneyed pastiche and gratuitous playacting and cash-grabbing crossover singles; instead, Yachty sounds unbridled and free, a rapper creatively liberated from the strictures of mainstream hip-hop. Long an oddball who’s delighted in defying traditional rap ethos and expectations,  Let’s Start Here  is a maximalist and multi-genre undertaking that rewrites the narrative of Yachty’s curious career trajectory. 

Admittedly, it’d be easy to write off the album as Tame Impala karaoke, a gimmicky record from a guy who heard Yves Tumor once and thought: Let’s do  that . But set aside your Yachty skepticism and probe the album’s surface a touch deeper. While the arrangements tend toward the obvious, the record remains an intricate, unraveling swell of sumptuous live instruments and reverb-drenched textures made more impressive by the fact that Yachty co-produced every song. Fielding support from an all-star cast of characters, including production work from former Chairlift member Patrick Wimberly, Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Jacob Portrait, Justin Raisen, Nick Hakim, and Magdalena Bay, and vocals from Daniel Caesar, Diana Gordon,  Foushée , Justine Skye, and Teezo Touchdown, Yachty surrounds himself with a group of disparately talented collaborators. You can hear the acute attention to detail and wide-scale ambition in the spaced-out denouement on “We Saw the Sun!” or on the blistering terror of “I’ve Officially Lost Vision!!!!” or during the cool romanticism of “Say Something.” Though occasionally overindulgent,  Let’s Start Here  is a spectacular statement from hip-hop’s prevailing weirdo. It’s not shocking that Yachty took another hard left—but how exactly did he end up  here ?

In 2016, as the forefather of “bubblegum trap” ascended into mainstream consciousness, an achievement like  Let’s Start Here  would’ve seemed inconceivable. The then 18-year-old Yachty gained national attention when a pair of his songs, “One Night” and “Minnesota,” went viral. Though clearly indebted to hip-hop trailblazers Lil B, Chief Keef, and Young Thug, his work instantly stood apart from the gritted-teeth toughness of his Atlanta trap contemporaries. Yachty flaunted a childlike awe and cartoonish demeanor that communicated a swaggering, unbothered cool. His singsong flows and campy melodies contained a winking humor to them, a subversive playfulness that endeared him to a generation of very online kids who saw themselves in Yachty’s goofy, eccentric persona. He starred in Sprite  commercials alongside LeBron James, performed live shows at the  Museum of Modern Art , and modeled in Kanye West’s  Life of Pablo  listening event at Madison Square Garden. Relishing in his cultural influence, he declared to the  New York Times  that he was not a rapper but an  artist. “And I’m more than an artist,” he added. “I’m a brand.”

 As Sheldon Pearce pointed out in his Pitchfork  review of Yachty’s 2016 mixtape,  Lil Boat , “There isn’t a single thing Lil Yachty’s doing that someone else isn’t doing better, and in richer details.” He wasn’t wrong. While Yachty’s songs were charming and catchy (and, sometimes, convincing), his music was often tangential to his brand. What was the point of rapping as sharply as the Migos or singing as intensely as Trippie Redd when you’d inked deals with Nautica and Target, possessed a sixth-sense for going viral, and had incoming collaborations with Katy Perry and Carly Rae Jepsen? What mattered more was his presentation: the candy-red hair and beaded braids, the spectacular smile that showed rows of rainbow-bedazzled grills, the wobbly, weak falsetto that defaulted to a chintzy nursery rhyme cadence. He didn’t need technical ability or historical reverence to become a celebrity; he was a meme brought to life, the personification of hip-hop’s growing generational divide, a sudden star who, like so many other Soundcloud acts, seemed destined to crash and burn after a fleeting moment in the sun.

 One problem: the music wasn’t very good. Yachty’s debut album, 2017’s  Teenage Emotions, was a glitter-bomb of pop-rap explorations that floundered with shaky hooks and schmaltzy swings at crossover hits. Worse, his novelty began to fade, those sparkly, cheerful, and puerile bubblegum trap songs aging like day-old french fries. Even when he hued closer to hard-nosed rap on 2018’s  Lil Boat 2  and  Nuthin’ 2 Prove,  you could feel Yachty desperate to recapture the magic that once came so easily to him. But rap years are like dog years, and by 2020, Yachty no longer seemed so radically weird. He was an established rapper making mid mainstream rap. The only question now was whether we’d already seen the best of him.

If his next moves were any indication—writing the  theme song to the  Saved by the Bell  sitcom revival and announcing his involvement in an upcoming  movie based on the card game Uno—then the answer was yes. But in April 2021, Yachty dropped  Michigan Boat Boy,  a mixtape that saw him swapping conventional trap for Detroit and Flint’s fast-paced beats and plain-spoken flows. Never fully of a piece with his Atlanta colleagues, Yachty found a cohort of kindred spirits in Michigan, a troop of rappers whose humor, imagination, and debauchery matched his own. From the  looks of it, leaders in the scene like Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG, and YN Jay embraced Yachty with open arms, and  Michigan Boat Boy  thrives off that communion. 

 Then “ Poland ” happened. When Yachty uploaded the minute-and-a-half long track to Soundcloud a few months back, he received an unlikely and much needed jolt. Building off the rage rap production he played with on the  Birthday Mix 6  EP, “Poland” finds Yachty’s warbling about carrying pharmaceutical-grade cough syrup across international borders, a conceit that captured the imagination of TikTok and beyond. Recorded as a joke and released only after a leaked version went viral, the song has since amassed over a hundred-millions streams across all platforms. With his co-production flourishes (and adlibs) splattered across Drake and 21 Savage’s  Her Loss,  fans had reason to believe that Yachty’s creative potential had finally clicked into focus.

 But  Let’s Start Here  sounds nothing like “Poland”—in fact, the song doesn’t even appear on the project. Instead, amid a tapestry of scabrous guitars, searing bass, and vibrant drums, Yachty sounds right at home on this psych-rock spectacle of an album. He rarely raps, but his singing often relies on the virtues of his rapping: those greased-vowel deliveries and unrushed cadences, the autotune-sheathed vibrato. “Pretty,” for instance, is decidedly  not  a rap song—but what is it, then? It’s indebted to trap as much as it is ’90s R&B and MGMT, its drugged-out drums and warm keys able to house an indeterminate amount of ideas.

Yachty didn’t need to abandon hip-hop to find himself as an artist, but his experimental impulses helped him craft his first great album. Perhaps this is his lone dalliance in psych rock—maybe a return to trap is imminent. Or, maybe, he’ll make another 180, or venture deeper into the dystopia of corporate sponsorships. Who’s to say? For now, it’s invigorating to see Yachty shake loose the baggage of his teenage virality and emerge more fully into his adult artistic identity. His guise as a boundary-pushing rockstar isn’t a new archetype, but it’s an archetype he’s infused with his glittery idiosyncrasies. And look what he’s done: he’s once again morphed into a star the world didn’t see coming.

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Lil Yachty’s Great Gig in the Sky

Since the release of his Lil Boat mixtape in 2016, Lil Yachty has cultivated a peculiar rap career that has benefited from versatile musical interests. The Atlanta rapper, singer, and producer’s early work juggled booming southern trap drums, gauzy synths, unclearable samples , and melodic sensibilities on loan from children’s television. Shifting listlessly between disaffected snark and sweet repose, the best songs answered the question of what Brian Wilson’s teenage symphonies might’ve sounded like if he’d grown up hanging around the Migos. On future projects, Yachty leaned into the gruff anthems of his labelmates on Atlanta’s Quality Control Music, toughening up on 2018’s Lil Boat 2 in some of the ways Drake did on Scorpion the same year, this after dividing critics and listeners with the synthpop and reggae excursions on Yachty’s 2017 debut studio album Teenage Emotions .

Restlessness saves his catalog from the pedestrian work of peers chasing the sound of a beloved early mixtape. Lil Yachty is always up to something , quietly penning an undisclosed piece of the City Girls smash “Act Up,” or producing a chunk of Drake and 21 Savage’s Her Loss , or logging an unlikely chart hit about sneaking promethazine through customs . He’s a lightning rod for guys who see a new wave of absurdists and crooners as a displacement of rap traditionalism (rather than a continuation of a detailed history within it); he knows what the fans are into and where they’re getting into it online, so accusations about his music ruining hip-hop are complicated by every unforeseen success. The work varies greatly in style as well as quality, but being difficult to pin down also buys him freedom to make unusual plays.

Let’s Start Here , his fifth album and first full-length excursion into psychedelic rock, didn’t spawn entirely from nowhere, and not just because it sprung a leak under the name Sonic Beach a few weeks back. His appearance on a remix for Tame Impala’s Slow Rush jam “Breathe Deeper” hits a few of the markers the new album visits: the taste for psychotropic drugs and the interaction between the shimmering sound achieved by an elaborate pedal board and raps that feel both lightly thought through and also spirited and spontaneous. The first song, “The Black Seminole,” outlines the project’s guiding ethos, from its burbling, delay-drenched analog-synthesizer sound to the trippy changes and show-stopping vocal performance by “Bad Habit” co-writer Diana Gordon — all of which amount to an attempt to jam every idea housed in Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon into a single seven-minute performance. Bolstered by memorable spots from Gordon (who gives the Clare Torry screams in “Failure” and “Seminole” her all), Fousheé (whose softCORE album served rockers like “Die” and “Bored” that share Yachty’s love of walls of noise), and Justine Skye, the new album makes more space for women in its love songs than most rappers percolating on the charts tend to care to now. (Note also the presence of one Daystar Peterson in the credits as a co-writer on “Paint the Sky.”)

Let’s Start Here journeys back in time and out to space and sometimes up its own ass. It’s a drug odyssey that delightfully defies expectations whenever it’s not overindulging, taking its adulation for its influences from pastiche to parody, pushing its sound from psych to cacophony. Much will be made of Kevin Parker’s impact here, because Tame is also a project about savvily jumbling ideas from other eras and getting synthesizers to feel as delicately enveloping as puffs of smoke. It’s also an oversimplification of the scope of Let’s Start Here to call it Lil Yachty’s Tame album. Patrick Wimberly co-produced every song, and the snap of the drum sound and the flair for gooey horn accompaniment are assets Chairlift — Wimberly’s former group with Caroline Polachek and Aaron Pfenning — used to employ. U.K. producer Jam City and Yves Tumor collaborator Justin Raisen sat in on a lot of these, too; the maximalist sonics and the mix of love songs and acid-addled horror here are both a result of its pick of personnel and an authentic re-creation of the wild fluctuations of a lurid trip.

Its intriguing bio- and band chemistry are Let’s Start Here ’s gift and curse. “Running Out of Time” kicks off with drums that feel like Thundercat’s “Them Changes” (which, in turn, feels like Paul McCartney’s “Arrow Through Me”) and a bubbly bass line evoking “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers. Pushing through to a gorgeous bridge, matching vocals with Skye, Yachty pokes out from under the shadow of his forebears and delivers one of the finest bits of music he’s ever made. The blissed out “The Ride” plants the Texas rapper Teezo Touchdown into a wobbly groove that could’ve fit into last year’s Yeah Yeah Yeahs album. It feels like both songs could collapse at any moment, hanging a sharp turn into an unflattering section wrecking the momentum they built. Equally prone to swift tense shifts and long detours, Let’s Start Here meanders a great deal between highlights, raining sheets of sound that soak and weigh down the delicate grooves it’s trying to build. “Paint the Sky” sounds like a radio hit dropped into a flooded pit cave. These songs sink or swim on Lil Yachty’s ability to steady himself amid a maelstrom of phase-shifted guitars, delay-kissed drums, and synths shrouded in reverb. He’s a good study and a great hook man, but the novelty of some of his experiments wear off as ideas repeat and choruses get smothered. The less they tinker, the better.

Restraint guides Let’s Start Here to a few of its most sublime moments. “Pretty” will draw comparisons to Childish Gambino’s Awaken My Love! and the hit slow jam “Redbone,” but the drum programming recalls the stuff Prince did with the LinnDrum and the vocal performances feel inspired by cloud rap, a sensibility teased out in a cocky, carefree verse by Fousheé . “Say Something” strikes gold coolly poking around the pillowy synth pads and echoing drums of ’80s pop in the same way recent albums from the Weeknd picked up where Daft Punk left off in marrying dueling interests in 20th- and 21st-century popular music. “Pretty” and “Say Something” keep things relatively simple, stacking a few complementary ideas on top of each other and allowing space to breathe. (Other producers might abuse the clav hits in the latter for the old-school feel they bring, but this group lets them drift in and out of frame, recalling the minimalist trap lullabies on the back end of Lil Boat .) The noisier and less structurally sturdy cuts that surround them feel like the jams a band works through on the way to more refined compositions, before taking them on the road where they grow new layers of sound and significance. Let’s Start Here begs to be untangled in a live setting the way artists drawn to the tactile and communal experience of music tend to, allowed to drift over warm air, playing during the sunny days and reckless nights it describes.

Maybe this album is the new beginning its title implies, a first step toward tighter songcraft on the horizon, and maybe Yachty will pop back up in six to 18 months’ time on some different shit entirely, as is often his tendency. The new record finds him sniffing around the same intersections of pop, rock, psych, and soul as “Bad Habit” or Frank Ocean’s “Pretty Sweet,” sacrificing the brevity of his hits for a purposeful sensory overload, which sometimes works in his favor but sometimes encumbers tracks that ought to seem weightless. It is important for young artists to get the space to grow and change and eat mushrooms and make weird but enthusiastic indie-rock music.

Let’s Start Here fits into a long tradition of pleasant curveballs from rappers, unheralded classics like Q-Tip’s Kamaal the Abstract, side projects like the Beastie Boys and Suicidal Tendencies offshoot BS2000 , imperfect genre excursions like Kid Cudi’s WZRD , and effortless R&B pivots like Tyler, the Creator’s Igor . Yachty is stumbling down well-trod pathways, learning lessons imparted on generation after generation of listeners ever since Pink Floyd’s international breakthrough 50 years ago and taking metaphysical journeys endeavored since humans first discovered fungi and plants that made them see sounds and smell colors. The sharpest songs here could go toe-to-toe with the best in the artist’s back catalog, and the worst ones sound like excitable demos for various guitar pedals. Let’s Start Here isn’t Lil Yachty’s greatest work, but it goes over better than the pitch — “Poland” guy does shrooms and jams on instruments — implied it might. And if shoegaze-adjacent rockers like “I’ve Officially Lost Vision” and sound experiments like the one at the end of “We Saw the Sun” drone-pill even a fraction of the audience, it was all worth it.

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Music Features

Lil yachty's delightfully absurd path to 'let's start here'.

Matthew Ramirez

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 29: Lil Yachty performs on the Stage during day 2 of Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival 2017 at Exposition Park on October 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. Rich Fury/Getty Images hide caption

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 29: Lil Yachty performs on the Stage during day 2 of Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival 2017 at Exposition Park on October 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California.

Lil Yachty often worked better as an idea than a rapper. The late-decade morass of grifters like Lil Pump, amidst the self-serious reign of Future and Drake (eventual Yachty collaborators, for what it's worth), created a demand for something lighter, someone charismatic, a throwback to a time in the culture when characters like Biz Markie could score a hit or Kool Keith could sustain a career in one hyper-specific lane of rap fandom. Yachty fulfilled the role: His introduction to many was through a comedy skit soundtracked by his viral breakout "1 Night," which tapped into the song's deadpan delivery and was the perfect complement for its sleepy charm. The casual fan knows him best for a pair of collaborations in 2016: as one-half of the zeitgeist-defining single "Broccoli" with oddity D.R.A.M., or "iSpy," a top-five pop hit with backpack rapper Kyle. Yachty embodied the rapper as larger-than-life character — from his candy-colored braids to his winning smile — and while the songs themselves were interesting, you could be forgiven for wondering if there was anything substantial behind the fun, the grounds for the start of a long career.

As if to supplement his résumé, Yachty seemed to emerge as a multimedia star. Perhaps you remember him in a Target commercial; heard him during the credits for the Saved by the Bell reboot; spotted him on a cereal box; saw him co-starring in the ill-fated 2019 sequel to How High . TikTok microcelebrity followed. Then the sentences got more and more absurd: Chef Boyardee jingle with Donny Osmond; nine-minute video cosplaying as Oprah; lead actor in an UNO card game movie. Somewhere in a cross-section of pop-culture detritus and genuine hit-making talent is where Yachty resides. That he didn't fade away immediately is a testament to his charm as a cultural figure; Yachty satisfied a need, and in his refreshingly low-stakes appeal, you could imagine him as an MTV star in an alternate universe. Move the yardstick of cultural cachet from album sales to likes and he emerges as a generation-defining persona, if not musician.

Early success and exposure can threaten anyone's career, none so much as those connected to the precarious phenomenon of SoundCloud rap. Yachty's initial peak perhaps seeded his desire years later to sincerely pursue artistry with Let's Start Here , an album fit for his peculiar trajectory, because throughout the checks from Sprite and scolding Ebro interviews he never stopped releasing music, seemingly to satisfy no one other than himself and the generation of misfits that he seemed to be speaking for.

But to oversell him as a personality belittles his substantial catalog. Early mixtapes like Lil Boat and Summer Songs 2 , which prophetically brought rap tropes and pop sounds into harmony, were sustained by the teenage artist's commitment to selling the vibe of a track as he warbled its memorable hook. It was perhaps his insistence to demonstrate that he could rap, too, that most consistently pockmarked his output during this period. These misses were the necessary growing pains of a kid still finding his footing, and through time and persistence, a perceived weakness became a strength. Where his peers Lil Uzi Vert and Playboi Carti found new ways to express themselves in music, Yachty dug in his heels and became Quality Control's oddball representative, acquitting himself on guest appearances and graduating from punchline rapper to respectable vet culminating in the dense and rewarding Lil Boat 3 from 2020, Yachty's last official album.

Which is why the buzzy, viral "Poland" from the end of 2022 hit different — Yachty tapped back into the same lively tenor of his early breakthroughs. The vibrato was on ten, the beat menaced and hummed like a broken heater, he rapped about taking cough syrup in Poland, it was over in under two minutes and endlessly replayable. Yachty has already lived a full career arc in seven years — from the 2016 king of the teens, to budding superstar, to pitchman, to regional ambassador. But following "Poland" with self-aware attempts at similar virality would be a mistake, and you can't pivot your way to radio stardom after a hit like that, unless you're a marketing genius like Lil Nas X. How does he follow up his improbable second chance to grab the zeitgeist?

#NowPlaying

Lil yachty, 'poland'.

Let's Start Here is Lil Yachty's reinvention, a born-again Artist's Statement with no rapping. It's billed as psychedelic rock but has a decidedly accessible sound — the sun-kissed warmth of an agreeable Tame Impala song, with bounce-house rhythms and woozy guitars in the mode of Magdalena Bay and Mac DeMarco (both of whom guest on the album) — something that's not quite challenging but satisfying nonetheless. Contrast with 2021's Michigan Boy Boat , where Yachty performed as tour guide through Michigan rap: His presence was auxiliary by function on that tape, as he ceded the floor to Babyface Ray, Sada Baby and Rio Da Yung OG; it was tantalizing curation, if not a work of his own personal artistry. It's tempting to cast Let's Start Here as another act of roleplay, but what holds this album together is Yachty's magnetic pull. Whether or not you're someone who voluntarily listens to the Urban Outfitters-approved slate of artists he's drawing upon, his star presence is what keeps you engaged here.

Yachty has been in the studio recording this album since 2021, and the effort is tangible. He didn't chase "Poland" with more goofy novelties, but he also didn't spit this record out in a month. Opener (and highlight) "The Black Seminole" alternates between Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix-lite references. It's definitely a gauntlet thrown even if halfway through you start to wonder where Yachty is. The album's production team mostly consists of Patrick Wemberly (formerly of Chairlift), Jacob Portrait (of Unknown Mortal Orchestra), Jeremiah Raisen (who's produced for Charli XCX, Sky Ferreira and Drake) and Yachty himself, who's established himself as a talented producer since his early days. (MGMT's Ben Goldwasser also contributed.) The group does a formidable job composing music that is dense and layered enough to register as formally unconventional, if not exactly boundary-pushing. Yachty frequently reaches for his "Poland"-inspired uber-vibrato, which adds a bewitching texture to the songs, placing him in the center of the track. Other moments that work: the spoken-word interlude "Failure," thanks to contemplative strumming from Alex G, and "The Ride," a warm slow-burn that coasts on a Jam City beat, giving the album a lustrous Night Slugs moment. "I've Officially Lost Vision" thrashes like Yves Tumor.

Yet the best songs on Let's Start Here push Yachty's knack for hooks and snaking melodies to the fore and rely less on studio fireworks — the laid-back groove of "Running Out of Time," the mournful post-punk of "Should I B?" and the slow burn of "Pretty," which features a bombastic turn from vocalist Foushee. That Yachty's vaunted indie collaborators were able to work in simpatico with him proves his left-of-center bonafides. It's a reminder that he's often lined his projects with successful non-rap songs, curios like "Love Me Forever" from Lil Boat 2 and "Worth It" from Nuthin' 2 Prove . That renders Let's Start Here a less startling turn than it may appear at first glance, and also underlines his recurring talent for making off-kilter pop music, a gift no matter the perceived genre.

At a listening event for the record, Yachty stated: "I created [this] because I really wanted to be taken seriously as an artist. Not just some SoundCloud rapper, not some mumble rapper. Not some guy that just made one hit," seemingly aware of the culture war within his own genre and his place along the spectrum of low- to highbrow. To be sure, whether conscious of it or not, this kind of mentality is dismissive of rap music as an artform, and also undermines the good music Yachty has made in the past. Holing up in the studio to make digestibly "weird" indie-rock with a cast of talented white people isn't intrinsically more artistic or valid than viral hits or a one-off like "Poland." But this statement scans less as self-loathing and more as a renewed confidence, a tribute to the album's collective vision. And people like Joe Budden have been saying "I don't think Yachty is hip-hop " since he started. So what if he wants to break rank now?

Lil Yachty entered the cultural stage at 18, and has grown up in public. It adds up that, now 25, he would internalize all the scrutiny he's received and wish to cement his artistry after a few thankless years rewriting the rules for young, emerging rappers. Let's Start Here may not be the transcendent psychedelic rock album that he seeks, but it is reflective of an era of genreless "vibes" music. Many young listeners likely embraced Yachty and Tame Impala simultaneously; it tracks he would want to bring these sounds together in a genuine attempt to reach a wider audience. Nothing about this album is cynical, but it is opportunistic, a creation in line with both a shameless mixed-media existence and his everchanging pop alchemy. The "genre" tag in streaming metadata means less than it ever has. Credit to Yachty for putting that knowledge to use.

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Lil Yachty’s ‘Teenage Emotions’ Cover: Mykki Blanco, Cakes Da Killa, Adore Delano & More React

The album art features Yachty in the center of a movie theater, surrounded by people not normally represented in the media: a girl afflicted with vitiligo, an albino boy and -- perhaps the most…

By Patrick Crowley

Patrick Crowley

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Last Friday (April 21), Lil Yachty generated buzz after unveiling his album cover for his debut studio album, Teenage Emotions — and the chatter hasn’t stopped. The album art features Yachty in the center of a movie theater, surrounded by people not normally represented in the media: a girl afflicted with vitiligo, an albino boy and — perhaps the most controversial — a young gay couple making out.

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Mykki Blanco

The response has been generally positive, with people applauding Lil Boat’s decision to start a conversation with his album art. Billboard reached out to LGBTQ musicians to see what they thought.

Lawyer for Lizzo's Dancers Calls Out Singer Following 'I Quit' Post, Says It's an 'Outburst Seeking…

Gia: I think it’s a bold message coming from someone who is a familiar face in the rap community. I admire how Lil Yachty is so connected with his fans and becoming a voice for our generation. Yachty putting this on the cover is an example of acceptance of our differences and a much needed statement for the hip-hop community and the world to see. Any statement homogenizing the LGBTQ community in pop culture is amazing. We as a society need to continue spreading awareness. Those who have listeners or fans should try their best to use their platform.

Cakes Da Killa:  This is complicated. Obviously the cover is a marketing tool where every detail was thought out specifically to ensure a conversation, but what type of conversation is Yachty really trying to start? My initial thought: If the two boys kissing were black, honestly, that would be more impactful. I’m just like, yeah, bold move, but also this a little bit of a cop out. I’m just a little confused.

Trending on Billboard

Mykki Blanco:  I love Yachty. Sometimes, when rappers do certain things or when the hip-hop community gives a nod to LGBTQ issues, I roll my eyes a bit because I’m thinking, “Oh, so because this straight rapper acknowledges gay people or queer people or trans people, you all are willing to show some kind of faux sense of acceptance.” It’s like, do you have any gay friends? Would you actually be supportive of queer people in your normal life? Would you even be receptive to some of the queer musicians like Big Freedia? That kind of makes me roll my eyes. In the case of Yachty, he’s young — and he’s young in that way where when you see an artist like him do stuff, you just can read the purity in it. You can read that the intention is really genuine and that he’s not pandering to anybody. I think it’s groundbreaking because for someone of this age who has the audience that he has — for him to even use a small amount of his platform to do something like create his first album cover — and it has two men kissing. You know what I mean? I know some people in radical circles would say, “Oh, he couldn’t have chosen two men of color or he couldn’t have chosen this or he chosen that?” But it is what it is, and I do think it’s groundbreaking. I think that Yachty’s awesome.

Adore Delano: I find the cover badass! It’s a huge step for hip-hop to not only show support, but to have it on this album cover. I always think of the kids and what they’re going to see. This is an awesome image for pop culture right now.

Dai Burger:  I think this is a great cover. Not only is there a gay kiss, but he’s included people from different walks of life as well. I feel it could open a lot of his fans’ minds to realizing that we don’t all have to be the same to be considered ‘normal.’ We are all different — and that’s okay. I feel this embraces that, and to be honest, I’m here for it!

Taylor Bennett:  This choice to feature a gay kiss on his latest album cover was a bold, powerful, and respectable move from the bottom of Yachty’s heart. I believe it was a statement that most people — not just rappers or musicians — are afraid to make. Big ups from my team. Thanks Lil Boat!

Tish Hyman:  Lil Yachty’s album cover is awesome. I think it says exactly how he is feeling. He doesn’t care and that’s cool!

MUNA:  The variety of beauty in this photo is staggering and heart-melting. It’s not just the fact that he decided to include a gay couple kissing — it’s the inclusion of so many different types of people that American media has previously deemed too ‘other’ for a cover. An overweight girl, a body-modified punk, a black albino person, a girl with vitiligo — and Yachty right in the middle of it all with a rainbow smile. We are so on board the Lil Boat.

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Questlove Gives High Praise to Lil Yachty’s New Album: ‘I Love When Artists Pull off a Good Departure Record’

Lil Yachty has received a big cosign from Questlove for his new album Let’s Start Here . Hitting Instagram, Questlove shared the album’s cover art as the lead image of his praise for the young star.

“I had to let 24 hours go by just so I could process this,” Questlove wrote. “Then I hesitated cause I didn’t wanna use hyperbole to naturally give the trolls ammo to hate it or to further evidence sort why my co-signs are whack.”

He then added, “How should I put it? I really really really really love this @lilyachty record and I love when artists pull off a good departure record (departure albums are when musicians pull a COMPLETE creative left turn —-most times as a career sabotage of feeling doomed to not be able to live up to a standard they set. Not being able to make the Thelma & Louise jump. Quitting the job/relationship before you give em a chance to fire you—)”

You can read Questlove’s full thoughts on the release below.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Questlove (@questlove)

Lil Yachty’s new album, Let’s Start Here, continues to further the star’s reputation as an innovative savant. The new album is 15 tracks in length, delivering a new experience for fans.

Let’s Start Here was crafted in areas ranging from El Paso to Brooklyn, with Lil Yachty immersing himself in day and night sessions. The result is a Psychedelic Alternative album executive produced by SADPONY. The album is influenced by Pink Floyd’s classic Dark Side of the Moon and experiential psychedelic journeys.

Ahead of the album, Yachty released a skit titled “Department of Mental Tranquility.” In the skit, Yachty strolled a hallway entering what would be the first step into the rest of his life. Playing multiple roles, Yachty was introduced to his upcoming float experience in a sweltering room until it overcomes his body, and he is directed to room 10. What you hear is the result of that trip, double entendre, don’t even ask me how.

You can see the skit and hear the full album below.

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Lil Yachty Stuns Fans With Brand New Rock Album 'Let's Start Here'

By Tony M. Centeno

January 27, 2023

Lil Yachty has been teasing his new album for some time, but fans weren't ready for the psychedelic vibes he had in store. On Friday, January 27, the Quality Control rapper stunned the industry with his brand new album Let's Start Here. With help from a live band, Lil Boat puts rap to the side as he offers a fresh alternative rock vibe throughout the project. He self-produced 12 out of the 14 songs with contributions from executive producer SADPONY, Patrick Wimberly, Jake Portrait and plenty other beatmakers. The experimental LP has been in the works for over a year. Last January, he explained that he's always wanted to make an alternative rock album.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by C.V T (@lilyachty)

"My new album...it's a non-rap album, it's alternative. It's sick," he told Ice Box jewelers in Atlanta . "I've always wanted to [do an alternative album] but now I have met all these amazing musicians and producers." "It's like a psychedelic alternative project that's cool, it's different," he add. "It's different. It's all live instrumentation. I've changed my dynamic, you know what I'm sayin'? Like, I'm telling you, this album...I'm creating music a whole lot differently." Yachty embraces his love for Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon , which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year , and completely switches up his flow as he croons over live guitars and drums. Prior to the album's release, Yachty hosted an exclusive listening party in New Jersey. Initially he advertised "fine dining" on a flyer that went out earlier this week, but was actually just an assortment of snacks and drinks. Among the theater full of attendees were his friends Drake and Offset , who sat next to him in their reserved section.

Lil Yachty shows off the food menu at his album release party for “Lets Start Here” pic.twitter.com/TCVfv0jU4F — 2Cool2Blog (@2Cool2Blog) January 27, 2023

Lil Yachty at his album release party for “Lets Start Here” with Offset & Drake pic.twitter.com/kLxaWeS7pa — 2Cool2Blog (@2Cool2Blog) January 27, 2023

Drake was in attendance for Lil Yachty’s album release party tonight in New Jersey pic.twitter.com/yL1Yn6yOFJ — Drake Direct (@DrakeDirect_) January 27, 2023

Earlier this week, Yachty also dropped a teaser for the album, which could also be a sneak peek into his upcoming video. Let's Start Here. serves as the follow-up to his viral hit "Poland" and his 2021 album Michigan Boy Boat . The latter features Tee Grizzley , Icewear Vezzo , Babyface Ray , Sada Baby , BabyTron and more. Listen to Lil Yachty's new album below.

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Meet Giovanna, the Woman on Lil Yachty’s “Slide” Single Cover

Meet Giovanna Ramos, the woman who is on the cover of Lil Yachty's "Slide" single and in the music video.

Lil Yachty has been known to flex his canary yellow grills, and did so on the cover of his recent single “Strike (Holster).” Now, he tapped Ari Mairena-Dannon , also known as AMD Visuals, who has been working on several of his music videos lately, to snap a shot of someone else’s mouthpiece, too, for his latest track “Slide.” 

The smile in question belongs to Atlanta-based model  Giovanna Ramos . Ramos has several previous shoots with other grill pictures on her portfolio that mirror the bright, zoomed-in aesthetic that Yachty has been utilizing.

“Slide,” “Solo Steppin Crete Boy,” and “Strike (Holster)” all share a new kinetic energy that Lil Yachty has been harnessing lately. This energy is predicated on slippery lyrical pockets, smooth cadences, and wall-rattling beats that highlight his ear for production and maintain his abilities as a rapper. 

“There are a lot of times where he gets an idea or he makes a song and he wants to film it right there and then,” AMD Visuals says. “I always think to myself that if he wasn’t an artist, he would be an amazing director. He really has an eye for things, and truthfully, he pushes me to see things in a different perspective.” 

So how did Ramos get involved with Yachty? And why was she the perfect match for this project? In conversation with Ramos and “Slide” video director AMD Visuals, we find out where the grill came from, how the music video came together, and more. Get to know the face of Lil Yachty’s new summer track “Slide” below.

Who is the model?

View this photo on Instagram

The model on the cover of “Slide” and featured in the music video is Giovanna Ramos, a creative based in Atlanta. 

“I started modeling in 2019 a few months before the pandemic,” she tells Complex. “I had just moved back to NYC and decided that I would give it a shot and see where it takes me… Honestly, I just like to have fun with [modeling], I think the best part about modeling is that I’m 100 percent myself and that might be the reason I grew my socials so fast and people fuck with me so hard.”

How did she connect with Lil Yachty?

Ramos says that she and Yachty only connected a few months ago after she moved to Atlanta, but bonded immediately with each other and formed a close friendship. A few months later, she got an impromptu message to come out and be a part of the “Slide” music video.

“I genuinely did not know I was going to be the cover for these projects,” Ramos explains about her involvement in the “Slide” visuals. “[Yachty] sent me ‘Slide’ a while back and I kept telling him almost every day like ‘Bro this is my favorite song right now’ and then a few months later he hit me up saying ‘Come over tomorrow, we shooting the video’ and I was super excited. Like a week later he said he was dropping the songs. I went to sleep early on Thursday and woke up to him sending me a screenshot of the project and I was literally screaming. Man, I love him, forever thankful for that for real.”

Where did the grill come from?

behind the scenes of the “Slide” music video with @amdvisuals @lilyachty & @sosaisbacc 🛝 pic.twitter.com/vCpBOa0Wz6 — angel (@angelroman___) August 7, 2023

How did the “Slide” music video come together?

View this video on YouTube

The music video for “Slide” jumps from Poland to London and eventually lands with Yachty and his friends in his car in Atlanta. AMD Visuals explains how each of the different scenes in the video came together.

“We started filming the first scenes in Poland,” he says. “We had just arrived there at night and he told me he wanted to shoot a video. It was kind of late at night already so we just decided to shoot in his hotel room. From there we went to London and shot some more scenes. I wanted one more scene though, so we decided to shoot with his new car in ATL. We were using the resources we had available at the moment. The idea for the cover art came naturally too; I knew I wanted his close friend, Gio, to be in the video. Gio brings so much character and adds a nice element to the project.”

Ramos adds that the video shoot itself was chill and spontaneous as well. “He had basically did a barbecue, invited the guys over, we shot the video, ate, and that was pretty much it.”

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Lil Yachty's Concrete Boys Drop New Banger "FAMILY BUSINESS"

Yachty is once again showing off the young talent on his label.

Last year, Lil Yachty launched his new label CONCRETE BOYS under Quality Control. He's already gotten to work on filling out the roster with impressive young talent and has a new compilation on the way to help show off their talents. Last year the label dropped "MO JAMS" which came with the announcement of the upcoming compilation tape, even though the song isn't expected to appear on it. But now were finally getting a taste of some of Yachty's artists.

Lil Yachty himself is joined by CAMO and KARRAHBOOO on the absolute banger of a new song "FAMILY BUSINESS." The track also comes with an accompanying music video that is heavily stylized. It featured the various label members in matching baggy red shirts and big jeans in a variety of locations like a living room and outside a gas station. The description for the song also includes a link to pre-order the upcoming full label compilation, which also won't include this new song. It officially confirms that the album will drop pretty soon, hitting streaming on April 5.

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Lil Yachty And Concrete Boys' "FAMILY BUSINESS"

Lil Yachty just appeared on another new single from an up-and-coming talent. He teamed up with breakthrough TikTok star NEMZZZ for a sentimental new single called "IT'S US." That came just a few weeks after he teamed up with one of the breakthrough stars of electronica in 2023. Fred Again... had a massive year last year and kicked off his 2024 with the track "Stayinit" which featured an appearance from Yachty . What do you think of the new single from Lil Yachty's label Concrete Boyz? Are there any members of the group that you think have breakout potential? Let us know in the comment section below.

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Quotable Lyrics: Two pints, just Teezo Touchdown'd, I'm finna pour 'em both Geekin' off two X pills, my b*tch look like kaleidoscope I don't trip 'bout much, play 'bout my money or pints, I gotta fold you He such a stand up guy, how they f*ck him over?

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Lil Yachty Launches Concrete Rekordz With Quality Control/HYBE, Shares New Single Off Upcoming Compilation Album

Lil Yachty is officially running the show with a new venture under his belt, Concrete Rekordz.

The rapper, who once said "hip-hop is in a terrible place," is bringing some new stars into the genre, including Karrahbooo, DC2TRILL, Draft Day, and Camo!. The artists will also appear on Concrete Rekordz compilation album It’s Us Volume 1, scheduled to release on April 5. The artists were first introduced during Yachty's Field Trip Tour last year, which continues for the European leg this spring.

In addition to the news, Concrete Rekordz, also known as Concrete Boys, dropped a new single, "Family Business."

"Yachty has always had profound vision since the day we met and to see him take his curatorial magic and expand it to discover and enhance other artists is exciting to me," stated Quality Control Music COO and co-founder Kevin “Coach K” Lee in press materials.

“I’m excited to see Yachty step into the role of executive alongside being one of the most formidable creatives in the world with such an eye for talent," added QC CEO and co-founder Pierre “P” Thomas. "Karrahbooo is a star and they are all going to be the new wave of cool that can bring something different to the culture that is so badly needed.”

Check out music videos and an On the Radar cypher from the Concrete Rekordz roster below.

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