Tyler, the Creator’s ninth album received a very contemporary grand unveiling. Rush-released two days after its existence was announced, it had been trailed by the appearance of cryptic art installations at the rapper’s live shows – he’s still theoretically touring his last album, 2024’s Chromakopia – and at One World Trade Center in New York, and by a flurry of online gossip: one US website was forced to retract and apologise for publishing a tracklisting, complete with guest appearance by Kendrick Lamar, that turned out to be fake.
Despite all this, Tyler Okonma seemed keen to deflate the kind of anticipation that arises when your last three albums have all been critically lauded, platinum-selling chart-toppers full of big ideas. “Y’all better get them expectations and hopes down,” he posted on X, “this ain’t no concept nothing.” He then published an essay that read suspiciously like an explanation of the album’s concept, bemoaning the intrusion of cameraphones and social media on our ability to live in the moment: “Our human spirit got killed because of the fear of being a meme.”
