Let’s start with someone who clearly seems to be a crowd favorite, especially after this past weekend at Camp Flog Gnaw, the one and only Frank Ocean. His grammy-winning classic album Channel Orange was revered enough by fans that they were willing to wait patiently or not so patiently for five years because his album was so well received. I mean Frank literally had his fans watching him build a staircase for one hundred hours straight while they waited on the new album.
Joining this list is the one who many consider to be the best rapper of this generation. No one other than the G.O.A.T, Kendrick Lamar. Kedrick fans seem to be more patient and are okay with him taking as much time as he needs between Damn and whatever his next project is. Damn stood the test of time; you can still go back and catch something new like a hidden meaning or a metaphor that you didn’t realize was there. Kendrick earns that right by showing how much he cares about his art. Even if we look back to his debut album Good Kid, M.A.A.D City that dropped on October 22, 2012, it took him three years to craft a completely new sound and message with his follow up album To Pimp A Butterfly. Unlike Gucci who claims he likes to drop music because he wants people to enjoy as much music as he can make, Kendrick likes his music to contain a responsive message that the world needs to hear at that particular time.
Moving on to Pusha-T who has only dropped three solo albums and has taken at least two years between all of them. Daytona came three years after the album that he literally called the prelude; King Push - Darkest Before Dawn: The Prelude, to be exact. The man literally said, here’s the intro to something but you won’t hear a conclusion until three years later… but the fans were still eager to listen because of the respect that push has built over his long career.
Let’s not forget artists like Riri who even though it seems like Rihanna will never drop an album again because she’s too busy making millions of dollars doing everything but making music, she earned that right with her amazing catalog. But we will all definitely be ready to listen when she does. Another artist with a long career that started with the hip hop duo Outkast is proving to be one of the most consistent and unique artists in the game; none other than Andre 3000. There is no doubt in my mind that fans would be ready to listen fully to his solo album whenever or if it ever comes out. But other artists who had hits without true body of work have less time between projects before people start saying that they fell off. For example, hilarious adlib rapper, Desiigner. He dropped his debut project in 2016 which included the future impersonation and everybody’s favorite mumble rap song, Panda. However, the album didn’t include much else so Desiigner’s clock was ticking much faster than someone like Kendrick has proven and had a track record.
The other thing to keep in mind is that in the streaming era, if your album wasn’t as well received as you would have hoped, there is nothing wrong with coming right back with another drop. In fact, it might be the best possible play for you to simply drop another album and make your fans forget about your last one. Just look at what happened with Eminem. Em dropped Revival and as we all know, the album received some bad reviews...and by that I mean everyone from Joe Budden to Anthony Fantano was straight trashing his album. But instead of letting it linger, Em decided to just come right back swinging...literally. He threw disses at everyone in his unannounced 10th studio album that dropped just 8 months later titled, Kamikaze. Em let every hater, critic, and journalist know that he could still rap at the highest level. Another example could be Chance the Rapper. Now, keep in mind this is an opinionated statement (don’t send me death threats) but Chance might want to drop another project because his last studio album The Big Day was what many (except for Chance fans) would call, booty. Don’t get me wrong, he earned the right to take three years off in between projects because of how well received Coloring Book was but it wouldn’t hurt to follow up such an amazing album with something similar in quality.
And so the question remains, is it better for an artist’s career to drop more music even if it sacrifices the quality or should they wait a couple years to help craft their masterpiece?
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