Alright well not really. I’m not sure if anyone cares about J. Futuristic, but he’s becoming mildly omnipresent (on the internet?) and I like that he’s a good vehicle for stupid fruity crazy swag cotton candy carnival producers. As a rapper he brings about the bare minimum, but he’s pretty adept at sliding around with these densely melodic beats.“Sauce” is probably the best example— as a rap song it’s pretty laughable as the guy spends the whole time making a metaphor between swag and, like, A1 Steak Sauce and chicken alfredo (?), but it follows in the footsteps of “Swag Surfin'” as a song that makes barely any sense but is still a ringtone anthem. I credit K.E.

The main problem with J. Futuristic is that Yung LA basically stole his style wholesale, but pushed it totally over the top and at the same time perfected it into something that is unique and interesting instead of unique and laughable. As a rapper I think LA is a guy who can rarely carry his own song but he’s a great guest rapper, mostly because he’s a good enough lyricist to whip up a decent verse and that wispy sing-song flow can be a great antidote to more lyrical rappers like, say, T.I. or Young Dro. On Gucci’s “Everything”, for example, LA is perfect for a sort of sleepy song about laconic and routine flossing.

As a persona though LA is kind of fascinating. I find his embracing of quote unquote fruitiness to be pretty brave in the way that it confronts the idea of a what a trap rapper is and because, for lack of a better phrase, he doesn’t just talk about fruity swag, he lives it, as evidenced by the fact that he, uh, puts glitter in his hair. The softness of Yung LA is, I think, besides the point. I admire him for really pushing forward with a style in an era where so many rappers follow trends both musically and otherwise. I like M.O.P. for being rap’s flagship bone-crushers, and in a perverse way I like Yung LA for so unapologetically pushing the pendulum in the other direction.

This LA song called “Taser Gun” produced by Jim Jonsin is pretty incredible, it’s like if Cindy Lauper was reborn as an Atlanta trapper. Maybe Yung LA should star in a remake of “Napoleon Dynamite”.

(There might be a whole post coming soon about how the Jim Jonsin/Yung LA “era” of Grand Hustle has totally ruined Young Dro, who’s been so swallowed by the fruity swag Bermuda Triangle that a guy with the same name as him has been able to score a hit with a style of song that Young Dro all but minted.)