Earl Sweatshirt gives it to you straight with no frills: "Sick!" review 

I have been trying to get my mother to respect hip hop, but she typically views it through an extremely narrow, biased lens. This has been ongoing since I was 15, now I am 35. Oddly the most credence I've been able to garner is she knows I have a deep affinity towards all music, and that hip hop wasn't simply a fad for me. But thankfully I have shown her a few of your videos, mostly Kanye ones, and she is actually opening her mind to what I see. More as poetry and a way to see perspectives of a life we could never experience or fathom. So not only do I get to enjoy your perspectives on music I adore, and maybe even ones I have never even heard, my mother is starting to see those same perspectives. In return, she is gaining respect. It opens the dialogue for me to intertwine my passion for this music and what it is that I adore about it. Now she actually perceives and tries to understand, rather than simply dismiss it. So for that, I am infinitely thankful. Have a wonderful night/rest of your week!

billy woods verse on this album is incredible "Bury me in a borrowed suit. Give my babies my rhyme books, but tell 'em' 'Do you'"

The end of his album, Some Rap Songs, speaks about his experience of trying to be creative while living in the long shadows of his parents' success. The line "Family saw you on that stage, left it not amazed" always stuck with me.

One of the best descriptions I've ever seen of Earl's style was comparing it to expressionist art and the romantic poets-he's using small non-sequitur images that aren't linear and aren't telling a story, but are snippets of emotion and images used to evoke nostalgia, feeling, and poignancy. And the "chorus" to Fire in the Hole is a great example of that: "Seeping into the mulch, I needed a quick result / I read it and don't respond / She see it and salt sprinkle / I needed another go / I'm seeing her when I want." I interpreted it as his feelings sinking into himself and things taking time to grow even though he feels he's in need of something instantaneous; and because of this, he lashes out at "her," reading her text and not responding, her crying ("sprinkle salt"), and then "Fire leaping out the hole / Deep breathing only make it grow." Passion and meaning growing within him as he gives it time? Maybe, but like you said, there's no definitive meaning to much of what Earl's saying, but like the romantic poets, all these ambiguous images he's giving of nature and emotion paint something really abstract but emotionally potent. Shout out to you Skye-these reviews are great, and even when you don't fully "get it," you go in-depth and try your hardest to understand it, which a lot of people unfortunately are too close-minded to do with hip-hop. When, like you've said before, it's one of the most important and intellectually-stimulating sources of modern-day American writing. Cheers

Not sure if you noticed but the five o’s on me like the olimpics line has like 3 meanings 5 O’s -five ounces 5-0 -police 5 o’s -the olympics It was my favorite bar of last year so im glad you caught it too! Wasnt sure if you caught the 5 ounces

From your thoughts on Earl’s delivery on this album, I think you would really enjoy ‘Doris’

great review!!! someone should send this to earl i’m sure he’d get a lot out of it

Great album and just like SRS it’s an acquired taste. And his vocabulary is insane

knew you'd love the might pay the bills line. definitely my favorite off the record and a really interesting idea.

Even though you might not quite 'get' the album fully your review actually helped me understand it a lot more

Great review, happy that Earl is back. Oh yeh I was gonna say have you heard Navy Blue’s songs of sage post panic

"5-Os on me like the Olympics..." 5 Os refers not only to police who may harass earl because of his appearance or status but also the copious amounts of cannabis (Os = ounces) he probably keeps nearby at all times.

I’vv struggled to listen to the album for some weird reason even though I like it . I feel like it creates a vibe you have to be prepared for . When I’m feeling melo (like when I was high) , it was such a great listen .

hmm.. fascinating review. glad i found your channel, i like the perspective you're attempting to latch onto this album with, it's refreshing. you're extremely eloquent, i'm impressed.. i am so happy that you're digging into the lyrics and trying to find meaning within them. this is the type of review i never thought i'd see. so happy to be here. thanks. ✊🏽 oh and to harp on what you were saying towards the end of the video.. everything Earl is doing is intentional. like how you said he sounded drunk or sick on "Sick!" - you nailed it. you're getting it. Earl is an incredibly cerebral artist, your review is proof of it. no need to depreciate yourself over it.

You have the most nuanced and thought provoking thoughts on music these days. Gonna binge this channel now

imprecise words... dawg. Trying to explain an Earl album is like trying to explain the Tao. Nowhere2go.

Since you said your next review might be an artist from Rochester it got me thinking, you should check out the artist Rx Papi who is from Rochester, who came out with an album last year called “foreign exchange” and it really intrigued me due to its ethereal and dream like beats but just Menacing and heartbreaking lyrics. Given that he’s from Rochester I thought maybe it might interest you.

PLEASE do a review on Some Raps Songs. It's a once in a life time piece of art.

The heating sound was soothing btw

I really love your videos man, it’s great to hear a rap album analysed and reviewed with respect for the poetry.

Great analysis as always prof, Earl has such a good pen game. Please listen to Guerilla Toss! They have an album coming out in March, and I would love to see you talk about them. (: edit: Yo i just found your “What Would the Odd Do?” review, so you know what’s up. Looking forward to the Famously Alive review in March (^;

Appreciate you 🧡

This is easily my fav music-related RU-vid channel. Keep making fantastic videos!

Great review. I like how you approach things. Earl's a strange one. One of my favorite rappers, but I understand why he might be tough to get into. I was a fan of Earl before he got experimental and his raps were more straightforward. So I always knew he was a rhyming wordsmith. And when he went into his more experimental directions, I had this implicit trust and goodwill that someone who is newer to Earl might not. Fire in the Hole is a great song with a great verse. The way he rhymes words is crazy. Can't really put into words but it's unique and intricate and offbeat. And his diction has become very to the bone. Flint and marrow. Very visceral and embodied. He's basically an impressionist, weaving images and words together much like a memory would feel, or an ambiguous mush of emotions swirling around one's psyche. It's interior and insular. Like trying to breach into the symbolic psychodynamics of someone with no roadmap. The first three lines in the Fire in the Hole: Seeping into the mulch = sinking into depression (also note, it's technically "blood seeping into the mulch" the way he starts, but the 'blood' is not clearly said) I needed a quick result = I needed a remedy I read it and don't respond - talking about a relationship where he's ignoring her messages. The song seems to be about this relationship, Earl's push/pull in it

Malcolm X described so well how awful the institutional racism was at that time in America, and partly still is of course, by describing how badly those ‘folks’, as he could them, tried to look white. How they would look down onto the lower-class blacks. Very good read indeed, once again great analysis professor!

if you want to hear earl with more conventional hooks and features, I would recommend the Earl mixtape and Doris. He still gives it to you "straight no frills" but it's definitely more accessible

New viewer here. I really enjoy hearing your perspective. Very genuine and personal. Subscribed!

Earned a new subscriber for sure! You make some seriously interesting points and the way you analysed this entire album was just kind of amazing to me :) Good work

keep listening brotha, eventually it'll be for you and it will speak to your soul. i suggest giving Doris another spin as well.

Great video again Professor. Couldn't hear the heat fan btw

Auditing as we speak

The 2 song run of Tabula Rasa and Lye are so beautiful

Hey prof! The slang “5-O” refers to police officers. The “5-O on me like the olympics” bar actually means the police are on him. Great video tho!!

For the seeping in the mulch line, i have a theory that is probably wrong. What seeps into mulch? Water in a garden aka a reference to his flow. He “needs a quick result” could be a reference to him kind of meeting deadlines or meeting his own personal deadlines with writing and creating songs. And the last part “ i read it and dont respond” is him reading his rhymes(water/flow) in the mulch and thinking it isnt good enough, or maybe it is good enough and its so dope he has no words, idk just tlkn shizz

Can barely hear the fan, you're fine if it's on during a video imo

Thanks for the insight Professor. I encourage everyone in the comments to read “black awakening in capitalist America” by Robert Allen and the books “class struggle in Africa” and “neo-colonialism” both by Kwame Nkrumah(in addition to the autobiography of Malcolm x).

The 5 0s on me like the olympics could also reference the amount of money he has on him

Blood seeping into the mulch I need a quick result - I think he’s referencing the bloodshed of a spiritual war, needing a quick result as in being apathetic won’t help. SDS - somebody do something (a Mac miller reference) Blood seeping into the mulch also makes me think of blood on the leaves, Nina Simone

Hey Professor, I know you don’t like to go backwards and to respect that I have refrained from suggesting you do so up to this point. But man, I really think you should try to check out Earl’s debut ‘Doris’ and then his 2015 followup ‘I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside, An Album by Earl Sweatshirt’ (yes, that is the actual album title). You can skip his stuff with Odd Future but Doris really establishes a much clearer picture of Earl’s talent and artistic intent and his approach to hiphop and then IDLSIDGO begins the blurring and muddying of that initial sound, a subversion that is taken even further with the albums that come later. If you want to feel more like you ‘get’ what Earl is doing on the more recent leg of his discography, I feel like you’ve got to hear his earlier work for crucial context. Sorry if this sounds pretentious.

Professor, you might like "KISSES OF LIFE" by Mary Sue

Old Friend definitely has an Alchemist tag on it. The same one he started using with Boldy i believe. That beep/siren. Alc has done a few of those subtle ones thoughout his career and obviously has one of the first major producer tags anyways...

i just searcged the definition of mulch: material (such as decaying leaves, bark, or compost) spread around or over a plant to enrich or insulate the soil. So in conclusion I think he means to say that he was digging into his "shit" hoping to use it to enrich the growth process, yet he's a bit impatient coz he needs this growth to happen now.

Earl and boldy are my favorite rappers rn easy no questions asked.

Thank you

It’s cool ur dad recommended u Malcom x

don't care about heater noise!

"five o's on me like the olympics" could also be five ounces of weed!

With this album, I have felt like I'm too hard-headed to appreciate it. I think the more you listen to it, the more likely you are to find yourself in the right headspace to glean a new understanding from the lyrics during a particular listen. Over time, these insights compound and I've found myself with a wholistic view of the album which makes Earl one of my favorite artists of all time.

the flavorless antidote

i think our inexperiences, or even our experiences, block us from being able to access that deeper level of the music you speak of. like we just can’t relate sometimes since our lives are so different from the artist. that distance can be from the sound of the music or the lyrics themselves. there are so many poems i think are beautiful but my insights to them would never be accurate to the true intent of the poet just cuz me and the poet are so different, different time periods, different gender, different country, culture, age, whatever

the review is long than the album lol. nice job

I wouldn’t be surprised if earl literally recorded the title track while sick with omicron. He’s got guts

Here’s a comment for the algorithm, Teach

Could you do a review of Navy blue I would enjoy to hear what you think about him 💯

professor Skye I have an incredible idea and suggestion for you - uncertain if you haven't done this before, but would you review a video game OST's music? I thought of this while thinking about your Burial - AntiDawn review while simultaneously listening to the OST for Disco Elysium, which I was listening to after reading an amazing article about how the indie band Sea Power did some method acting type composition to create the soundtrack

i keep reading his name as Earl Sweetheart T_T

The fan is fine, barely noticed it

Skye can you find someone else to compare rappers to other than ghostface? I know you know more than that haha

feel the same way you do about Billy woods. I know he's great, but I just don't quite get it.

like a pear cider made from 100% pure pears

I thought u were Tim Roth for a sec

"the Magic of truth is way stronger than the Magic of make-believe" i would strongly argue with that but also its a giga vague statement (Nobody really knows the truth; whats counts as Part of the truth). I think Earl only placed it here in the context of blackness and racism as it says in the sample itself .. i really enjoyed that review tho thank you Prof. :)

16:05 do you listen to Lous and The Yazuka ?

5-0 on my like the Olympics can also be taken as a reference to drug testing too.

could you re listen to some rap songs to see if your feelings have changed about it. also i recommend listening to solace by him which is one of his best song hes made

See him live if you get a chance, you’ll appreciate him more.

“5 O’s on me like the olympics” is also referencing 5 ounces of weed

@Professor Skye's Record Review: "Stong spirit where the body couldn't get asylum" Earl is using a cigarette metaphor to describe the experience of a black man in America. Strong Spirit = American Spirit...the strongest American Spirit cigarette comes in a black box, and the American Spirit logo features a "black" native American man. Strong cigarettes are often described as "full-bodied". Also, "asylum" sounds similar to "a Salem"...Salem is a cigarette company that used the slogan "Salem Spirit" for YEARS. Salems are less expensive than American Spirits (American Spirits are higher in terms of cost/price). Also, in general, cigarettes are viewed as a product that is detrimental to one's health/life expectancy. Hence, one could interpret "Stong Spirit where the body couldn't get asylum" as "I'm a strong Black man in a country that wasn't meant for my health/safety/wellbeing". The interpretation above gives much more weight to the "cost of living high" bar

Tyrell Wellick?

I'd love for you to review some older albums. Like Genelec & Memphis Reigns - Scorpion circles, Company flow - Funcrusher plus, GZA - Liquid Swords, Dr. Octagonecologyst - Kool Keith, Deltron 3030. 👌

My top 10 Emcees 1 Eminem 2 jayz 3lupe fiasco 4royce 59 5 Kendrick 6 kool g rap 7 nas 8 biggie 9 beans 10 jada earl sweatshirt honorable mention though

If you haven’t, you need to listen to Oldie by Odd Future

For anyone confused about what Critical Race Theory is, just watch James Lindsey's New Discourses Podcast. Any episdoe with the phrase in the title should do just fine.

Please listen to MIKE he inspired a lot of what this album is I think you’ll understand more after listening

This guy compared Aesop to GFK now Earl? Lol wtf

The world really did not need Earl over trap beats. Best tracks are the ones where he sticks to the formula: Old Friend, Lye, Fire in the Hole. The rest is mediocre

Critical race theory as something only people from law school can discuss? Absolute rubbish. Why should this be the one sacred thing in this modern world? No reason. What other subject would the professor say we may not question an attorney on? Granted, maybe the prof. puts too much stock in the value of higher education to justify the sacrifices he made to attain his papers. Keep in mind none of the rappers he idolizes in reviews have matched his education, yet they're free to discuss whatever is important to them. Attorneys defend things they dont believe in regularly.