Wiz's disappointing album run continues on "Khalifa"
Take a look at Pittsburgh rapper, singer and world-renowned smoker Wiz Khalifa’s discography and it’s easy to not feel impressed. His debut album “Rolling Papers” was largely a disappointment, so much so that he wrote a letter to fans saying, “…creatively it wasn’t my best work.”
The average albums continued with “O.N.I.F.C” and “Blacc Hollywood” as fans struggled to adjust to Wiz’s musical movement towards a more pop-heavy style and continued to wait for the next “Kush & Orange Juice,” the mixtape that launched Wiz into the stratosphere and in our hot box playlists in 2010.
A lot has changed with Wiz since that album dropped. His style has changed, both fashion-wise and sonically. He’s had a child, a marriage and a separation, a trending beef with Kanye West on Twitter and a Grammy nominated track in “See You Again” with Charlie Puth. His close friend Curren$y described Wiz as a planet, but the one album where he can bring all of his styles together to create an enjoyable, cohesive project is still soaring through the cosmos somewhere.
“Khalifa,” Wiz’s fourth album in what has become quite a career for the “Black and Yellow” rapper, tries to be a more personal album—mainly in the first five songs. Sadly, all the personal moments are so vague and non-descriptive that it loses any impact it could have had. Basic verses like “humble beginnings, rich ass endings” on the album opener “BTS (Behind The Scene),” or the elementary level rhymes on the following track “Celebrate,” doesn’t give us a deeper look into Wiz’s life. Meanwhile, the production has the same pop-rap element that made Wiz a household name, but in the process turned away many longtime fans.
He doesn’t need to give away his diary, or delve into all of his most personal stories during a smoke session, but there is nothing new to learn about the Pittsburgh rapper in these initial tracks. Without much to truly connect listeners, the majority of these songs end up being downright boring and uninspiring. The most personal “Khalifa” gets is when Wiz and his son Sebastian go back and forth on “Zoney,” which is one of the best moments of the entire project.
The latter portions of the album show the trap-influenced and laid back Wiz that made him popular with the underground community. “Bake Sale” is an absolute banger as Travis Scott controls the hook with his signature auto-tuned vocals. Wiz sounds right at home as he maneuvers through the ground-shaking bass, hard snare drums and futuristic sounds, changing flows at will while also shifting the tone of the album.
His familiar feel continues with the two-part track “Lit.” The first part was released in the middle last year, but is now massively improved with vocals on the hook and an extra verse at the tail end of the track from Taylor Gang crooner Ty Dolla $ign. The laid back yet bass heavy beat feels like a smoke session under palm trees with 80 degree weather and is easily one of the better tracks of the album.
The final moments of “Khalifa” will likely drive longtime Wiz fans insane because that classic album potential is still there.
The biggest knock on Wiz has been his lackluster album history, and his most recent project does little to break the mold he’s created for himself. In an interview with radio station HOT 97, he stated that “Rolling Papers 2” will be dropping this year—hopefully before the summer. Maybe that’ll be the “Kush & Orange Juice” level album we’ve been waiting for, but “Khalifa” is just another project that missed the mark.