Let me start this article by saying rest in peace to Lil Peep (Gustav Ahr) and XXXTentacion (Jahseh Onfroy) whom were taken from this planet way too early. In each of their musical careers they showed great promise, potential, and it is unimaginable what their music might have sounded like had they not been killed by drugs and guns.
Recently the duo were used in a brand new single "Falling Down" which is an alternate version of the song "Sunlight On Your Skin" created by Lil Peep and cowritten/produced by iLoveMakonnen. After Peep passed away, X showed interest in the song and the artist. In an interview that is featured on the track, he can even be heard saying how he wanted to make a song with Peep and was disappointed that he didn't get the chance to. X goes on to say it's tragic how we only appreciate someone when they're gone. "Falling Down" was finalized by producers Smokeasac and John Cunningham, and released by Colombia Records earlier this month.
This track has received very mixed reviews from listeners due to the complicated relationship Peep had with X. Some claim that Peep would have never wanted to work with X due to their different views on treating women, and assertions that X was a homophobe. This assertion stems from X beating up his cellmate in prison when he learned that the cellmate was gay. A lot is still unknown about the violence between X and his cellmate. The SoundCloud artist Fat Nick is a mutual friend of Peep and X and disagrees that Peep wouldn't have wanted to work with X because of the fact that they listened to his music together. Nick claims that Peep told him that he eventually wanted to work with X and that its sad that he wasn't able to do so while he was alive. Additionally, Peep and X's mothers are also at a disagreement about this track due to how each one of them would have wanted the music to sound. Peep's mom told his fans that she was disappointed with the new song, while X's mom did the opposite to X's fans.
This song began by Lil Peep singing lyrics "Come let's watch the rain as its falling down" that are placed behind an excerpt of X's interview about Peep. Moving forward, the track gets precedingly more like Pop music than the trap-rap the duo usually creates. There is also an exceedingly annoying clap track that is used every few seconds. Lyrics to this song "Sunlight on your skin when I'm not around. Shit don't feel the same when you're out of town" show a shallow sadness that X and Peep attempt to convey. This shallowness is new to Peep's style of music because he usually displays a rawer type of depression. Lyrics like "I know that I'm not that important to you, but to me girl you're so much more than gorgeous. So much more than perfect." from his song "Star Shopping", and "I used to wanna kill myself. Came up still wanna kill myself. My life is going nowhere, I want everyone to know that I don't care" off his track "Omfg" represent this idea.
Overall, I found this track to be very disappointing. I was excited to hear new music from Lil Peep and I believe that if he and XXXTentacion were still alive, they would have definitely made better music than this. It is to my own belief that the record company is trying to milk as much money from each artist as possible because they own so much of them. It is understandable that a company would want to create a product that they received revenue for, however I believe that they withdrew what made each artist unique and replaced it with Pop music that will always appeal to the mass audience. This song received a 1 out of 10 and I would not purchase this track on vinyl. Here's to hoping each artist gets their old music pressed on vinyl.
