Earl Sweatshirt made a fairly morose first impression. The 21-year-old member of rap collective Odd Future dragged listeners into a lyrically grotesque world on his self-titled 2010 mixtape, then went for more personal musings on his 2013 major-label debut, Doris. He sticks to similarly introspective territory on this followup: his molasses-thick vocals roll through tongue-twisting wordplay, battling to be heard over his disjointed, bass-heavy beats. Earl has spoken about feeling more comfortable in his own skin as the years go by, and that mellowed honesty manifests itself on Faucet’s denouncement of insincere hangers-on, and in frequent mentions of his late grandmother on the single Grief and opener Huey. The album staggers by quickly, making it easy to miss a lacerating line here or clever double entendre there. In that respect, it lends itself well to multiple listens. Or, as he bluntly tweeted: “WHEN YOU GET DONE LISTENING TO IT, LISTEN TO IT AGAIN, THATS WHY ITS 30 MINUTES NUMBNUTS.”
