Lil Wayne’s album Funeral came out January 31st after it was first announced in 2016. If you flip the cover upside down it cleverly also spells Lil Wayne. The album is a continuation of his 2010 album Rebirth. Funeral is Lil Wayne’s fifth album to go number one on the charts. It has many featured artists including names such as Adam Levine, 2 Chainz, and XXXTentacion.

“I Do It” was the only single released from the album. Funeral has 24 tracks and the album as a whole takes an hour and sixteen minutes to listen through. Plus, with ten features it’s no wonder why the album feels bloated.

I personally had a hard time getting through the middle slog because the songs didn’t offer much for me to grab onto. I was writing my passing thoughts on the songs while I was listening and, while the first few tracks I had a good amount of notes for, I really couldn’t find anything memorable in most of the songs after.

The album does have a tribute to the late Kobe Bryant ,who died in a helicopter crash just five days before the release of Funeral. In the song, Lil Wayne and Jay Rock rap about achieving king status in the game just like Kobe with basketball. It ends with 24 seconds of silence. 

Funeral was given mixed reviews. Some critics felt it was too long and unoriginal while others thought it was decent, but certainly not the best. It’s something that fans of Lil Wayne will enjoy, but not an album that will catch your attention if you’re not already familiar with him. 

It seems like the album doesn’t really know what it’s doing. It throws everything out there, but only a few songs are strong enough to stick. It’s a good album, just not cohesive enough, and it offers very little.

Would I recommend this album? Well, yes, if you’re a Lil Wayne fan or big into rap, but if you’re just looking for something to casually bop to or an intro to Wayne’s music then this album probably isn’t the direction to go. It certainly doesn’t live up to his older classics.

As a 25-year-old singer and songwriter, Ari Leff has really made a name for himself. Professionally known as Lauv, Ari is a singer and guitarist. On March 6th, 2020 he will be debuting his album how i’m feeling. His fans are buzzing about his new album; all the songs are very fun but also have a deeper meaning which is interesting to listen to. 

He already has 3 million views on YouTube with his new, romance packed song “Tattoos Together” which was released on January 16th, 2020.

His music videos are usually bright and very catchy. Once interviewed about his new song he says, “This is one of my favorite videos I’ve ever done cause I’ve recently done a few heavier, more existential videos, but “Tattoos” is just straight fun the whole time….and I got to prove to the world once again that I can’t dance.” 

In 2017, he had his first hit song “I Like Me Better” and continues to make more electronic pop based music. He says that “I Like Me Better” was the fastest song he has ever written and he says it may just be one of his most popular. His career has been lifting ever since. 

With his collaboration with popular K-Pop group, BTS, and with Billie Eillish, Khalid and more, his fans are excited to see what comes next.

His songs have been played in popular TV series and movies such as Grey’s Anatomy, 13 Reasons Why, and To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before. So when you listen to his songs you may recognize his extremely talented voice.

He is touring through many different countries for almost the entire year and will be stopping in Minneapolis on July 28th, 2020. He is going to travel the world, sharing his songs and his upbeat energy. 

The 62nd annual Grammy Awards took place in Los Angeles, California in the Staples Center on Sunday, January 26th. The Grammy Awards, a show where musicians from all different genres from Country to Rap, get recognition for the work that they released within the last year.

Just 10 days before the award show was about to take place, there was a removal of a pivotal member of the Recording Academy, chief Deborah Dugan after strong allegations of misconduct at the nonprofit. The Grammy Awards took place on a rather somber and heartbreaking Sunday as hours before the awards show began, NBA and Los Angeles Laker legend, Kobe Bryant and 8 others, including his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna Bryant, tragically lost their lives in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, CA.

Due to that heartbreaking loss, hundreds of people started gathering around the Staples Center, where Kobe Bryant played for 20 years, before the Grammys started. The Grammy administration started telling people to leave the area before the award show but no one budged. Conversations started about even canceling the award show because it was “disrespectful” to host an award show at an arena that many called an arena Kobe Bryant built.

The show started off with a performance from Pop-Rap artist, Lizzo. Before her performance she stated that her performance was dedicated to Kobe, “Tonight is for Kobe!” she yelled at the start. After Lizzo’s performance, the host, Alicia Keys, who has won 15 Grammys in the past, started the show off immediately acknowledging Kobe Bryant. Boyz II Men and Alicia Keys sang to honor Kobe Bryant, and the 8 others lost in the helicopter crash. Throughout the night, Kobe Bryant was always brought up.

Many artists performed throughout the night from many genres including Billie Eilish, Lil Nas X and Ariana Grande.

The big winner of the night was 18-year-old pop singer, Billie Eilish. She won five of the six awards she was nominated for, including winning all four of the big categories: Album, Song, Record of the Year, and Best New Artist. She became the first artist to sweep these awards since Christopher Cross in 1981. At 18, she is also the youngest person to win Album of the Year.

At the end of the show, DJ Khaled, YG, and Roddy Ricch all came out to perform for a tribute to the late Los Angeles rapper, Nipsey Hussle, who was shot and killed this past March at his clothing store. Nipsey Hussle, who was nominated for his first studio album, Victory Lap attended the Grammys in 2019 but never won a Grammy. This year however, he posthumously won 2 Grammys for his song “Racks In the Middle.”

The Grammys had the lowest ratings ever in their 62 years of the shows airing but, many iconic things occurred. 

by. Brandon Raine

2019 music has mostly been about rap music like big stars like NBA Youngboy, Lil Baby and Megan Thee Stallion, but I’m going to give you an update from other local and big rappers along in the USA on their way to the top of the rap game.

Minnesota rappers El Lordoo and El Robbo have been dropping hits back to back bringing St. Paul on notice by dropping songs like “Alexander Wang” and “Trenches” which has over 2k views on YouTube in the last couple of months.

Staying in the midwest, Chicago best Lil 40 keeps applying pressure to the rap game by getting features from famous rapper Lil Herb which he averages over 20k views per song that he drops.

Autotune is becoming very popular, and a new wave, for all the hip hop artists. It changes your pitch or how you sing in the studio, and this addition has made songs more likeable towards different audiences.

We can soon expect artist G Herbo to drop his highly anticipated album in the weeks to come; hints that it might be coming out because G Herbo released a single last week which he kind of was using his old flow that made him popular.

Rod Wave has been blowing up since he dropped his album Ghetto Gospel on all platforms, with Pitchfork ranking his album 8 out of 10, and music listeners saying his album is very relatable and relaxing.

Also, female artist Asian da Brat just dropped a new album called Fight Night which includes a verse from Nle Choopa, Yella Beezy and Yung Bleu.

While NBA Youngboy is the most streamed artist right now in the USA other rappers like Da Baby and Rod Wave seem to be closing the gap.

The collab of NBA Young Boy and Juice Wrld Bandit was the most streamed rap song this past week.

More rappers should be dropping off new albums and songs next week for you rap fans.

Layton Greene was born in Missouri, on December 4, 1998. She became an overnight star in late 2017, when she made a video of herself singing Kodak Black’s “Roll in Peace”; it went viral with millions of views.

After the video went viral, she went into the studio with producer G-Styles and recorded an extended version of the song.

After that, she jumped into the top 15 of Billboard’s Hot R&B songs chart, and record labels started to take an interest in her.

“I always felt I was destined for this,’’ she said. “I try to find the light in every situation. Ever since I was a little girl, I knew I was going to be a professional singer. I knew I would be famous one day. I didn’t know how it was going to happen. I just knew it would.’’

She then introduced her new album two months ago Tell Your Story so the world could get to know her. The album is also about the struggles she has faced in life. She hopes that the new album also inspires others to tell their stories, and let others get to know them.

The 7th  song, “I Love You” has around a 5 million views on YouTube. It’s about a former flame and their toxic relationship.

Her love for music has attracted fans all over the world. Her voice is great and it fits the overall theme of the song “I Love You,” and the lyrics are enjoyable. Her lyrics are worth listening to again and again.

Overall, I would give Greene’s song a 9/10.

Nicki Minaj was born in the Caribbean but moved to New York when she was 5 years old. Nicki Minaj’s father was a drug addict with a long history of violence.

At the age of 12, Minaj casted her own first rap. Minaj then decided to go into acting at LaGuardia High School of Music and Arts. But her acting career didn’t do as well as she wanted it to, so she went into music and started to write her own songs.

She was then found by the Dirty Money CEO Fendi, who signed her to his label. From there on, Nicki Minaj’s music went well.

Nicki Minaj has recently announced that she has gotten married to a rapper from New York named Kenneth Petty. They both teased the internet for a long time hinting about their upcoming marriage.

Nicki Minaj posted an Instagram photo of two matching mugs that said “Mrs and Mr” and baseball caps that said “bride and groom.”

Also, she announced that she got married October 21st. They met in Sutherland Jamaica, Queens back in elementary school and they became childhood sweethearts. 

They announced their relationship last December. In January 2019, Nicki said on twitter “we were like this about earlier since we were very young kids in the hood.”

On her “Queen” radio show on Apple Music in August, she revealed that her and her fiancé were going to get married in 80 days.

Nicki Minaj’s husband committed crimes in the past. One of them was attempted rape in 1995, and he was guilty of manslauhter in 2006. He is labeled as a level 2 sex offender because of the 1995 rape conviction.

Nicki Minaj responded to fans about Petty’s past and she stated that the girl he allegedly raped was 15 and he was 16 and how they were in a relationship.

(I just want to preface this with the fact that Tyler the Creator’s music isn’t super “PG friendly,” so um… keep that in mind before giving him a listen).

Tyler Gregory Okonma, more professionally known as Tyler the Creator, is an American rapper, producer (like actually a producer, he makes all the instrumentals he sings over) from the musical conglomerate known as Odd Future, will have released his fifth studio album by the time this article is published, and his fans are undoubtedly pumped. But, for all you new fans out there (or even potentially new fans judging how good this album will be), where do you go from here? Whether you just finished listening to the album, or you’ve just overheard your peers talking about him, if you want to know more, you’ve come to the right place. So, here’s a little bit of a timeline of his musical career. (I’m not going to do anything about his personal life, because this article is more about the art, rather than the artist).

In 2009, Tyler released his his first debut project, known as Bastard, it was almost entirely produced on FL studio, and so it is not necessarily considered a real “studio” album; some simply consider it a mixtape. It went on to become critically acclaimed, ranking at 32 on Pitchforks top 50 albums of 2010. It was also very popular for it’s single “French.” The album followed Tyler going through somewhat of a therapy session with his therapist character known as Dr. T.C. (wonder what that stands for), sometimes intervening, and asking Tyler concept questions in order to start off a song. It contains noticeably intense lyrics with lots of devotion to shocking subjects. It also contained many samples from various songs from artists such as Dexter Wansel, Cortex, and Jay-Z.

When Goblin released, it was noticeably similar to Bastard in a few ways (while also being wildly different, if that makes any sense). First off, it again starts off with a therapy session with Dr. T.C., but this time, instead of Tyler starting off by talking about his depression, or other negative aspects of his life, he talks about how he had gotten famous, and how his newfound fame is now affecting him.

Wolf was an intense change in tune for Tyler the Creator, as his music had much less intense synths. He also displayed a vast shift in lyrical themes, with making music with a more relaxed aesthetic along with shifting away from the horror core genre he previously established for himself in his previous two albums. The album also accompanied the single “Domo23.”

Tyler then went on to release his third studio album of his, known as Cherry Bomb. It featured a very unique sound, which elevated itself throughout all of the songs of the album, in a kind of similar way to Wolf. But the certain sound was this very intense grainy bass, as opposed to this rhythmic dreamlike synth (okay I’ll stop praising Wolf for a sec). This grainy bass was very consistent throughout all of the tracks, which made this album very unique in nature, and very different from everything Tyler had produced up until this point, as he somewhat refrained from using raw noise like this (which I do commemorate him for on that, and for taking such a risk).

Flower Boy is (as before IGOR drops) Tyler’s newest (released in 2017), and seemingly most mainstream album. It is VASTLY different from any of his other works and I don’t just mean it uses a unique sound kit, I mean it’s almost as if he’s a different artist entirely. The lyrics feature an infinitely less violent tone, and more of an introspective or “deep” thoughts to them.

So yeah, that’s basically it. Since then, he’s released a couple singles, but nothing really of note (I mean he did the soundtrack for that new Grinch movie, but I don’t really think that’s worth my time, or yours for that matter). But on May 17th, he will have released his newest album IGOR, and from what I’ve seen from the kind of odd, but not very futuristic (pun fully intended) teasers, he’s uploaded to his youtube channel, its gonna be pretty good.

By: Daniela Fernandez and Maddie Baggenstoss

It’s been awhile since we’ve heard any new Taylor Swift music. The last new music we heard from her was from her Reputation album back in 2017.

Before the release of her new song, Taylor left many clues for fans to find. She posted 11 Instagram pictures all with the caption 4.26 which led many fans to think she would be releasing either a new album or single on that day. She then added a countdown on her website and Instagram story to mark the day all her fans were waiting for.

Then on April 26, 2019 she released her new song called “ME!” with Panic! At The Disco’s lead singer Brendon Urie. This song is very different from her Reputation album. It sounds very bright, cheerful, and peppy; as compared to the darker tone in her last album.

The song was released with a music video which represents a new change in Taylor’s music. Click here to watch the music video. With the video released many fans have decoded it to find hidden messages and clues for what lies ahead. According to Time Magazine, one of the messages fans have discovered is a snake transforming into butterflies. This is clearly referencing her Reputation album, which had a few major themes including snakes. The snakes represented all of the people who ruined her reputation. The snake transforming into butterflies most likely represents Taylor herself leaving behind her past drama in favor of a more positive style of music. Then fans found a painting of the Dixie Chicks in the background possibly telling them there would be a collab soon. All of the clocks in the apartment seen were set to 8:30 which many fans think is when Taylor will be releasing new music; August 30th. There are many more clues and messages throughout the video. To read more about them click here.

Swift and Urie performed their new hit song at this year’s Billboard Music Awards on May 1, 2019. According to CNN, their performance then sparked controversy because they were accused of copying Beyoncé’s 2018 Coachella performance. In both performances marching bands and drum lines were used, and the lightning was also very similar. Some have pointed out these similarities while others believe it is just bad timing. Beyoncé fans are using the hashtag #mayochella to mock the fact that Swift copied the Coachella performance in May.

In response to these allegations, many fans have taken it upon themselves to point out the fact that this is not the first time a drum line or marching band was used in a performance according to CNN. Many pointed out that Prince used them at his iconic Super Bowl Halftime Show in 2007, Gwen Stefani at the Teen Choice Awards in 2005, and Madonna in 2012 for her MDNA tour. Lastly, fans pointed out that Taylor Swift used a marching band in her “You Belong with Me” music video back in 2009.