After quite a wait LongLiveA$AP is finally here. It’s not quite Detox in terms of continual delay and postponement, but there’s only so long a fledgling artist can sustain the attention Harlem’s A$AP Rocky has received without a full release proper. There’s good reason as to why LongLiveA$AP has been so hotly anticipated, with 2011 mixtape LiveLoveA$AP setting a high standard; immersing the listener into a world of spaced-out slowed vocals and Clams Casino produced hazy beats over which Rocky’s not-so-sweet nothings concerning drugs, sex and money were stylishly delivered, paving the way to a multi-million dollar record deal.
Expectations were raised further still when the list of collaborators on LongLiveA$AP was released. Not only had Rocky managed to unite the best of hip-hop’s ‘new school’ with features from Drake, Joey Bada$$ and Kendrick Lamar amongst others, but he’d also made concerted attempts at mainstream crossover with ‘Wild For The Night’ being produced by Skrillex and ‘I Come Apart’ featuring Florence Welch. In the end, it feels a little like A$AP Rocky was trying to do too much at once and lost sight of what brought him success initially. Clams Casino produced ‘LVL’ stands as an early highlight, providing a luscious reverb-drenched beat for Rocky to glide over. The problem really is that there isn’t enough of Clams Casino on this record, because as a whole it lacks the cohesion his beats lent to LiveLoveA$AP.
Instead of a Clams-produced paradise, we’re objected to an absolute abomination of a beat on ‘Wild For The Night’, with Skrillex providing a Street Fighter button-mashing combination of shrill beeps and bleeps that has no place on this record, or anywhere for that matter. Same goes for ‘Fashion Killa’. Sandwiched between these tracks however is Hitboy-produced ‘1Train’, on which A$AP Rocky commands the mic alongside pretty much every notable rising rapper and isn’t outshined. There’s very strong single material in ‘Goldie’ and ‘Fucking Problems’, but that alone can’t propel the record from good to great. Frustratingly we’re left with a fragmented record which expends too much energy on courting the commercial and cementing A$AP Rocky’s personal brand, as opposed to providing a platform to display his full potential as a rapper.
Rishi Modha 