Rapper Joey Bada$$ announces three-song bundle 'The Light Pack' to 'exterminate ' mumble rap
Brooklyn rapper Joey Bada$$ plans to put an end to mumble rap with his newest project 'The Light Pack'. Before the release of the three-song bundle, the rapper briefly teased its content with a Twitter announcement on July 16.
“This is mumble rap extermination,” he wrote. “This is godly interpolation.” You can watch a preview of what to expect here. Joey has also made it clear his project is not an EP before its scheduled release on July 17. “Don’t call it an EP, I hate that. It’s 3 songs, bundled together. #TheLightPack," he wrote on Twitter. With his announcement, he promised that the tracks will serve the “mind, body & soul” of his listeners and added he chose three songs to signify the three years it’s been since 2017’s 'All-Amerikkkan Bada$$'. With featured artists such as J Cole, ScHoolboy Q, Styles P, reggae artist Chronixx, Flatbush Zombies’ Meechy Darko and his Pro Era artists Kirk Knight and Nyck Caution, the album debuted at No. 5 on the Billboard 200.
According to HipHopDX, Joey said in an interview, “The thing with this project is everyone’s going to be satisfied, and not in a way where it’s too many things on the menu." He added, “I’m definitely not that type. You come to my restaurant, motherf**ker, it’s like 10 options. I hate when motherf**kers put out an album longer than 14 songs. Nobody wants to f**king listen to that.”
Although the mumble rap style has become popular, we may have to agree with Joey's sentiment there, as it defers from the lyrical emphasis in hip-hop. Lyrical rapping and mumble rapping are successful in their own right - the expression each to their own applies - but the latter takes an alternate path that could see the former fading over time: a tragedy for the history of hip-hop greats such as 2Pac, Jay-Z, Wu-Tang Clan, Snoop Dogg, Public Enemy, and many more. Modern lyrical rappers such as Drake, Travis Scott, Eminem, are prominent in the industry and still respect apt wording paired with good music, but mumble rap is on the rise and not everyone is exactly on board.
Let's not ignore the fact that artistry and effort play a huge part in listeners' piqued interest. Simply put, do you want to hang a painting on the wall that feels like it was made on a whim or one that feels like more thought was put into it? Our universal language is getting a dumbing-down treatment, labeled as cool and sharp as accurate speech appears too boomer. In 20 years, would Eminem's lyrics be shrugged off as boomer because it is old?