![]() ![]() ![]() Cole: 4 Your Eyez Only” documentary, which is available in full on YouTube. Named after his latest album, the special mixes short music videos with clips of Cole’s conversations with Black residents of Southern and Midwestern cities like Fayetteville and Ferguson about police brutality and community empowerment. Portions of the video, which you can see above, originally appeared in “ J. The rapper used his surveillance video of the raid as his music video for “Neighbors,” which he released yesterday (May 1). Cole” Cole from the judgment of neighbors and police, who sent a SWAT team to his North Carolina studio under suspicion that he and fellow artists were growing and selling marijuana. Cole’s position in the industry as an artist who creates strong feelings: you either love him or you hate him.Wealth and fame did not shield Jermaine “ J. Cole has something important to say or not, there are a lot of people out there willing to listen. “KOD” became the most streamed album on Apple Music in its first day. Cole has earned the right to state his conclusions definitively, then the album may be a little harder to stomach. If you are willing to accept his authority, you’ll enjoy the album and what he says will resonate with you. ![]() Cole assumes his authority is enough to convince the listener. Instead of describing how and why he came to his conclusions about drugs and moderation, J. This narrative approach is all but absent on “KOD.” J. ![]() Cole makes his distant pain understandable. Through the stories of his experiences, J. Cole paints pictures of events that have affected him and invites the listener to remember with him. His best music, “Wet Dreamz” from “2014 Forest Hills Drive” and “Neighbors” from “4 Your Eyez Only,” are narrative songs that are grossly lacking on “KOD.” J. While “KOD” is a well-built and enjoyable album, it does not have what has always made J. In this case, he chooses a low-hanging issue and approaches it with a lazy solution. But he ends up saying nothing of substance other than that it is “messing with my health.” “Brackets,” another low point on the album, finds Cole proposing a smartphone-based direct democracy and illogically ripping on taxes. On “Photograph,” he makes a clumsy attempt to disparage the current state of love in a world defined by social media. He is a capable wordsmith, and “KOD” does not tell you any differently.īut not everything J. Cole performs this old-head shtick in a manner worth listening to. He sympathizes with the juvenile pitfalls that new-coming rappers often fall into, while at the same time giving some words of warning and restraint. “1985,” the final song on the album is a pseudo-diss-track at the newest wave of hip-hop. Cole to make high energy, mainstream songs while staying true to himself, it is not a trend on which his music is reliant. While that more thematic type of song allows J. The two rappers have unapologetically never been about money, but that does not stop them from living in a world that is. Cole fires off, “Count it up,” repeatedly. Kendrick grits out, “Shut your f-– mouth and get some cash, you b-,” whereas J. These types of songs use the rapper’s voice to represent the pressures they feel outside of the music. “KOD” and other album highlights like “ATM” and “Motiv8” all function in a thematically similar way to Kendrick Lamar’s “untitled 07” from his “untitled unmastered” mixtape. Cole effortlessly spits about his come-up and hyperbolizes motifs of drug use over errantly-rumbling 808s. “KOD,” the titular first track of the album, hits hard. Cole is certain, and he will do anything to make you certain as well. His pinky is meant to alleviate doubt, make you believe in him and his music. Cole’s newly released album, “KOD,” he, in agreeance with Patrick Star, stands a king with pinky finger extended. Patrick Star once uttered what has since become law: “When in doubt, pinky out.”Īnd on the cover art of J. ![]()
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