Lil Wop :: Halloween

First two questions people ask about Lil Wop: “Is Lil Wop related to Famous Dex?” Yes. That’s his cousin. “Is Lil Wop bisexual?” Possibly. At one point he came out as bi on Instagram, but the post has since been removed. Rap culture has a complicated and often negative attitude toward people who color outside of the “straight and heterosexual” box. I’m not telling stories here — you only have to listen to enough songs that use the words faggot, gay, dyke and queer as slurs to know it’s a prevalent prejudice. I hope that’s not the reason Wop withdrew his post. I’d like to see him live his best life honestly, loving who he wants and how he wants, but if talking about his personal life drew a lot of unwanted negativity I understand why he deleted it and distanced himself from it.

“I get money, that’s my only fucking hobby”

You certainly won’t find any raps about it on “Halloween.” Whatever his life outside music might be, his life on the beat conforms to all of the tropes of gangster rap. “I like money, I like bitches, I like guns” quips Wop on “Smell Like Money,” all familiar and recurring topics for the emcee. He never strays too far from the themes that brought him to the dance, even if his cousin Dex might have stuck a foot in the door to get him on the dance floor. One other thing that never changes is his vocals. Wop is remarkably consistent in an equally remarkable way — he always sounds like a throat cancer patient talking through a box by holding a finger up to the hole. I can’t tell whether he’s happy, sad, excited or depressed because there’s no pitch, timbre, quiver or tone to his voice at all.

Whether he’s rapping about “Bad Bitches” or “Sport” it’s entirely indistinguishable. For 16 songs on his album the only thing that changes from one to the next is the backing instrumental, and on the latter of the aforementioned tracks it’s just bad. Someone keeps making “psshew” sound effects, the tempo doesn’t seem to match his lackadaisical delivery, and the instruments don’t create enough atmosphere around him to let his smoky vocals fill the room. You’re left listening to him talk about how he has to hustle to eat, ball and fuck but you wind up not caring at all.

I feel like I need to emphasize this given that rap has such a bad history with homophobia — Lil Wop should be out there in a major way. Whether or not his music suits my personal tastes is entirely secondary to the fact representation is important. Maybe that was just too much pressure for him on “Halloween” though, which feels ironic given that he raps like someone with the least amount of pressure on him ever. He sounds like he doesn’t give a fuck about what he’s saying or doing at all times. In its own way, combined with his enormously crunchy vocals, that can be appealing for short amounts of time. What hurts Lil Wop isn’t his orientation but his lack of subject matter and lack of dope beats to make him more interesting. Change up your lyrics a little and hire better producers Wop, but never let anybody tell you how to live your life.