New York’s own Post Malone, following the success of his double platinum debut album “Stoney,” released his highly-anticipated sophomore album, “beerbongs and bentleys” on April 27.
While it is still too early to tell if Malone’s newest album will match “Stoney” in terms of popularity, “beerbongs and bentleys” has already been qualified for platinum status, and it’s no surprise to see why.
A majority of his songs have trap-like beats with guitars and drums coming from the production, but he sings about relationships and break-ups. People could think that these aspects might not gel together, but Malone has found his niche and has continued to build his sound around it.
The 18-track, 64-minute album has some big name features in Nicki Minaj on the track “Ball For Me” and G-Eazy and YG on the song “Same Bitches.” Just like his first album, Malone keeps the feature list relatively small, only having five songs with a guest on it.
The singer/rapper had built up the hype for this album, starting with the release of the first single, “rockstar” featuring 21 Savage back in September. The song was a major hit, jumping to the top of a majority of music charts, becoming both Malone and Savage’s first number one song on the Billboard 100.
The second single, “Psycho” featuring Ty Dolla $ign, was released on Feb. 23. Just like “rockstar,” the song skyrocketed up the charts, peaking at number two on the Billboard chart. Like “rockstar” and many songs on the album, Malone uses his dark, eerie, yet banger-esque production to mix with his sad, lonely boy lyrics.
The album opens with “Paranoid,” where Malone details his doubts and worries about his life after his rapid rise to fame. The singer has released several mixtapes on SoundCloud in the past, but didn’t gain the recognition he has now until releasing “White Iverson” back in August 2015. In the span of just over two years, Malone has gone from SoundCloud singer to hip-hop megastar.
Malone shines the brightest on tracks like “Zack and Codeine,” “Over Now,” “Better Now,” “Blame It On Me” and “92 Explorer.” “Over Now,” “Better Now” and “Blame It On Me” are tracks with themes of break-ups and heartbreak, with Malone singing “I seen you with your other dude, he seemed like he was pretty cool. I was so broken over you, life it goes on, what can you do?” on “Better Now.”
On “Zack and Codeine,” Malone delves into the more atypical hip-hop style of performing, singing about money and how he’s better than everyone else, specifically with the lyrics “Made a hundred bands, so all your hands out (all your hands out), no, my friend, can’t do no handouts (do no handouts). All these rappers, they sound the same now (sound the same now), sayin’ I’m to blame, now y’all see me on the TV (yeah).”
Malone has had a bit of controversy in past months, being called the “Donald Trump of hip-hop” by a recording label and a “culture-vulture” by several media publications. While some may view that as truth, there’s no denying that Post Malone is a bonafide superstar.
As an album, the songs sound a bit generic after a while, but I think Malone’s project shouldn’t be viewed as an album. If you were to make a playlist of a bunch of different music and throw every song off this album in the mix and shuffle it, every song from “beerbongs and bentleys” is fantastic on its own.
The album is a very solid project and has a chance to reach the levels of “Stoney,” and there’s no denying that Malone is an artist that doesn’t appear to be slowing down any time soon.
