Going platinum with no features.
That was the benchmark that J. Cole reached on his last album. For those who do not know what that means, going Platinum with no features means that the album sold 1 million copies without having any other artist featured on the album. A feat that is not achieved by many artists, let alone, a rapper.
It has been exactly 2 years since J. Cole's last album, 2014 Forest Hills, which was the biggest breath of fresh air that the hip-hop game has ever had at the time of its release. His latest project, 4 Your Eyez Only, is almost as good as his previous effort, if not better. The Fayetteville, North Carolina raised rapper delivers one of his more polarizing works of his career, but, it more than lives up to the wait.
The reason why I say that it is polarizing is that there are not really any songs on the album that the majority of people would go crazy to, or, to use a more current term, there are no bangers on the album.
Cole took this chance to make an album that sounds so much like his life, but, it is not about him at all. The album tells a story of one of Cole's friends from back home whose life paralleled Cole's, but, got caught up in the drug game and did not become one of the best rappers in the game.
Cole did really not do too much to stir up talk about the album, he did, however, get people talking about the album. He released two songs, "False Prophets" and "everybody dies" which both got the world nodding their heads as well as talking about the lyrical content in the songs.
On "False Prophets", Cole talks about the downfall of a superstar who does not make the same music that he used to make. Many people thought that the song was directed at Drake, Lil' Wayne, or Wale, but the song seems to be directed at Kanye West. Going after one of the biggest rappers in the game who cannot defend himself at the moment is a move that most people would laugh at, but, Cole was serious about the words he said.
He doubled down on the song "everybody dies", on which he calls out Lil' Yachty and Lil' Uzi Vert and asking them to please stop rapping. On the song, he says that he does care anymore about his appearance and wants to just rap, which he does in this album.
Even though the singles were very strong, they did not fit into the narrative of the album, so, Cole did not put them in the album.
In conclusion, 4 Your Eyez Only is one of J. Cole's best albums because of the way the production and rapping come together. I believe that J. Cole is one of the last real rappers out right now, and this album only backs up my point even more.
