The trap genre — throughout 2016 — does not readily permit any eccentricity from its core identity. Artists on opposite ends of the East Coast, each with contexts and stories uniquely their own, still doggedly follow the prototypical trap ethos: money, drugs, girls and the pursuit of such.
Young Thug is not too different. However, the rapper chooses to reject the modern face of his genre in a less brash manner than with irate criticism of subject matter. Young Thug is more subtle. With his latest album, “JEFFERY,” he has become a trap iconoclast by cherry-picking the most alluring aspects of his genre and skewing, melding and warping them into a brave, new and gripping format.
Notable even before opening the album, Young Thug’s cover art is a visual microcosm for the record as a whole. On a stark white background, the rapper sports a frilled, periwinkle dress and a confident lean. Good luck finding something like this on the cover of the next Future LP.
Track by track, Young Thug stretches trap through a study of how the genre is a spectrum rather than a binary. The beats range from cloudy and Yung Lean-esque to the more typical driving, angry trap beats one would expect.
This range wasn’t just found in his composition, however. On “JEFFERY,” Young Thug’s flow is as all over the place as ever. He switches up his meter and bars many times, even within songs. Somehow, though, he never sounds disjointed or jumpy. It’s constantly impressive how Young Thug manages to traverse an entire spectrum of themes without his work being diluted.
Young Thug’s voice has also granted him the uncommon merit and identity he holds in the trap sphere. His subject matter is often “softer” than what is typically found in his genre; on tracks such as “Harambe” he stutters bars about hopeless infatuation and companionship. Young Thug still approaches these themes with very quintessential trap styles, which have been accentuated and modified by his penchant for genre fluidity.
“JEFFERY” is an album of contrasting halves: Emotional yet aloof, masculine yet feminine, ethereal yet hard-hitting. In this most recent record, Young Thug is telling the world he will thoroughly resist being pigeonholed and tied down by superfluous labels, and he thinks listeners should too. His message is endlessly refreshing in the trap community.
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