The album and lyrics discussed contain profanity and are intended for mature audiences
On October 16th, 2024, an Instagram account with the unusual name @feliciathegoat, posted a one-minute and thirty-second video with a background track of marching and a high-pitched chorus that awoke a fan base of millions. The account then exploded with pictures and clips of a black man in a supervillainous face mask, a black and white suit, and a cartoonish haircut. The clips teased fans with melodramatic beats and hyperactive lyrics. One significant picture showed the ominous man in his color-lacking suit, on the cover of an album titled “Chromakopia”, a term that means intense bursts of color and life–a life the suited man seems to crave, reaching out from the album cover as if seeking refuge from the light to escape his inner darkness.
The mastermind behind the unique character, deep backstory, and Instagram promotion is American rapper, producer, director, and fashion designer Tyler Gregory Okonma, a.k.a Tyler the Creator. He is best known for being a member of the hip-hop group Odd Future and for hits such as “See You Again” (2017), “New Magic Wand” (2019), and “Yonkers” (2011). Okonma’s album “Chromakopia” was officially released on all platforms, on October 28th, 2024, and is the first album he has released in three years after his critically acclaimed “Call Me If You Get Lost” in the summer of 2021. Something significant about “Chromakopia” was the 6:00 a.m., early Monday morning release, which differs from other artists which usually release on Fridays at midnight. “People on the weekends, they just want to chill and hang out. So they’re not listening,” said Okonma in a 2023 YouTube interview with eclectic radio show host, Nardwaur. “But I think if you put it out during the week, man. That commute to work or that commute to school,….you have that hour or thirty minutes to dive in and listen.” He explained that he feels it’s disrespectful to put it out at midnight when most people are sleeping because most would stay up to hear it. He felt his different approach would cause fewer people to deprive themselves of sleep, and they would just listen to the album when they woke up.
“Chromakopia” is narrated throughout by Okonma’s mother, Bonita Smith. The way the songs intertwine with his mother’s words gives us insight into how he valued his mother’s advice, opinions, and apologies. The album opens with a track titled “St.Chroma”,featuring Canadian R&B singer-songwriter Daniel Caesar, that introduces us to Okonma’s masked character, St.Chroma.The track starts with his mother saying in a passionate voice “You are the light. It’s not on you, it’s in you. Don’t you ever in your motherf**king life dim your light for nobody.” The light-focused introduction and the black-and-white album visuals seem to contrast how he feels and what he is seeking, symbolizing his inner struggle.
The darkness Okonma explores in the album is caused by his personal struggles, such as growing up fatherless and anxieties about aging. These aspects are emphasized by the song “Like Him” featuring Lola Young, which goes over Okonma’s lifelong question, does he look like his father? These fears are also shown in the lyrics in his song “Tomorrow” such as, “these jet black strands are turning gray” and “all I got is photos of my ‘Rari’(Maserati) and some silly suits.” His fear of having kids stems deeply from his absence of a father which his mother takes the blame for at the end of “Like Him” saying, “You know, it was my fault. Not him ‘cause he always wanted to be there for you. And I’m sorry I was young, but he always wanted to be a father to you. So I f**ked up and I take ownership.”
Okonma also foreshadows his mother’s admittance in “Hey Jane” where at the beginning of the song she strongly warns him to always wear a condom. In “Hey Jane” Okonma is heard writing a letter to a woman he got pregnant and is sharing his fears of having a child, and tells her whatever she wants to do with the baby is fine with him. He also tells her “You gotta deal with all the mental and physical change. All the heaviest emotions and the physical pain, just to give the kid the man’s last name?” which may hint at some anger from his father’s absence. This also left him with struggles of commitment which are highlighted in the song “Darling I” featuring American rapper, Teezo Touchdown where Okonma discusses his issue with constantly falling in and out of love. This emotion is proven in the lyrics “I’m at the altar but I’m still searchin” and “I’m thinkin’ new crib, I’m thinkin’ two kids until I get infatuated with a new b**ch.” which shows how he struggles to find the one for himself.’ The album also goes through his struggles of fame with the song “Noid”, short for paranoid, where he sings “Never trust a b**ch if they good they could trap you” or when he closed out his song “Rah Tah Tah Tah” with the lyrics “I’m paranoid now cause […] weird and really bums.”
Outside of the emotion-heavy songs, there is one song that has received heavy media attention, with its shocking features and heavy backbeat. That song is “Sticky” which features rap artist Glorilla, Sexxy Red, and the legendary New Orleans native, Lil Wayne. The song has been recognized for a certain part where Okonma repeats, “Better grab a mop it’s getting sticky in this b**ch.” with a strong repetitive horn backbeat. The song has collected many majorette and dance routines and brought together a collective of many requesting for HBCUs (historically black colleges) to include Okonma’s new track in their next band routine.
My rating of the album would be a solid 7.5 out of 10. I honestly had low expectations going into this album, so I wouldn’t be disappointed when it came out. I am a big Tyler the Creator fan, and would probably listen to anything he put out, which may have biased my strong liking. My only critique would be his lyricism. I feel there were some points where he could’ve amplified his lyrics more to add more to the story, like in “Tomorrow” where he says “I’m gaining weight I’d rather rest. The thought of children brings me stress because time is changing.” It just seemed very straightforward and blasé. I prefer hidden meanings behind words and he seemed more creative in his other albums. For example, one of my favorite lyrics of his is in the song “Gone Gone/Thank You” from his Grammy Award-winning 2019 album “Igor.” The song says “Now it’s 90 degrees and all the tricks up my sleeve, is drenched in sweat and delusion because I jet to conclusions.” He uses literary devices like personification to bring his lyrics to life and to leave interpretation, while in “Chromakopia” some of his lyrics lost that strong sense of poetry for me. While I feel that most of the hype for “Chromakopia” did deliver, how do others feel?
“It’s good, I expected it to kinda be better though. I don’t like how a lot of the songs sound similar, they’re a little repetitive,” said senior, John Lindvig, who is an avid Tyler the Creator listener. I do agree with Lindvig about the repetitiveness of the songs. There were way too many similarities between the song “Sticky” and “Thought I Was Dead” such as the use of horns and the hyper energy. I probably would’ve found less between them if he didn’t use the same method of chanting a phrase over and over again in both of the songs. That also ties to my comment on the lack of creativity. There were so many elements he would use in his other albums that would immerse his listeners that I feel on some points he strayed away from. Lindvig also explained that he felt that there was lots of hype behind the album, and he may have expected too much from “Chromakopia”. Lindvig and I share the same rating of 7.5 out of 10 on the album. While we both give it a rating on the higher side, two of our peers have very different opinions.
“I don’t really like the album,” said freshman Donovan Boyd (D.J.) “It feels like a whole bunch of words put together on songs.” Boyd’s opinion also matched another freshman, Oreoluwakitan Aregbesola. Aregbesola also complained about the bad flow of the album and how the features were also poor. “How did Sexxy Red and Tyler the Creator collaborate on this? They make two different types of music.” Said Aregbesola. He also stated he doesn’t understand why people are “glazing” the album hard as if it’s not trash. They both didn’t give the most satisfactory ratings either, Boyd giving it a 5, and Aregbesola giving it a 3.
Overall, while it was a good album, I don’t feel it was Tyler’s best. There were many opportunities where he missed his usual points of immersion. Again Okonma treats his albums like milestones of different emotions he’s felt at certain points in his life. I don’t share any of the same struggles that Okonma expresses in the album which may be why some parts don’t hit as hard. I’ll honestly say that if I were a new fan with no expectations it would’ve been my top listen of the year, which sums up my listening experience to the passable album, Chromakopia.
References:
NardwuarServiette (2023, November 13), Nardwaur vs. Tyler the Creator, youtube.com Youtube
https://youtu.be/JGY71JdCny4?si=uJ7gWaL9t7w4kwsA
