Because the Internet

Album Review: Childish Gambino – Because the Internet

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I’m late af with this review, but I wanted to wait until I got a physical copy to listen to it. First off, check out the irony of the album cover. He’s wearing a vacation shirt, as if he’s supposed to be having fun, but has the facial expression of an overworked, stress out, middle-class father. Like as soon as he comes home after work and puts his hat down, his two little kids run up to him looking like

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“Daddy, let’s play!”

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“If these little niggas don’t get the fuck out my face…”

The album follows a screenplay that Donald wrote, and the song are supposed to be played while reading the screenplay. They fit pretty well. Donald plays a rich kid, that spends all his time on the internet, hence the title, and is relevant for that reason apparently. I read the whole thing; it was decent I guess. I ain’t going into much detail about it. If you wanna know, go read the shit. Now on to the music.

The production on this album is very dope, and ‘Bino produced the majority of this project with his frequent collaborator, Ludwig Göransson. They ain’t no Neptunes, but these two make a pretty good production duo. Some beats were bangers with some trap influence (Sweatpants, The Crawl) some were slow, melodic, and atmospheric, (Telegraph Ave.,) and some were pop influenced (3005). Had alot of variety with the sounds. Some live instruments here and there.

The songs Gambino had after Camp, leading up to Because the Internet,weren’t as interesting to me as the stuff he had on Culdesac, EP,  and Camp. On those projects he had doper wordplay, and alot more quotables compared to Royalty. It’s like after he stopped using the weird, high voice, the appeal in the lyrics left as well. I loved “Yaphett Kotto” though., or however you spell that shit, Overall, I think the lyrics and punchlines on this album is a step up from Royalty. “Crawl” is a fun song to listen to. I like the vocals on the chorus from Kai, the singing part ‘Bino does when he says “At her boootyyy”, and there were a fair share of quotables. The poppy single, “3005” is a catchy tune, has a cool hook, and is a also a step in the right direction with the wordplay. It manages to be pop influenced without being annoying like an actual pop record. My favorite on here is called “Sweatpants”, and that reminds me of his older music more than anything else. Playing the part of an arrogant, “Rich kid asshole”, and just going all out with the part. Problem comes through on the chorus, with saying just a sentence, “Don’t be mad ’cause I’m doin’ me better than you doin’ you.” Simple, but I like it. “The Worst Guys”, ft. Chance the Rapper, is another upbeat song, but I ain’t really to crazy about this one. It ain’t bad, but it’s skip-worthy. Just not too much going on in that song that makes me give a fuck about it.

There was some good vibe music on here too, like “Telegraph Ave.” and “Party”. The majority of both of those songs consist of him singing and then dropping a rap verse on each song toward their ends. The rap verse on “Party” was especially tight. It really is cool how these songs make a good soundtrack for the screenplay.

Some songs on here, I don’t fuck with in any way, shape or form yo. Like “Worldstar”…nah man, can’t get jiggy with that. I mean, I get the point of the song but that shit just sound like noise to me. Kinda stupid, just like a Worldstar video. Off to my recycle bin with that shit. All the singing got kinda old after a while too. Like damn near half of this album is singing. He’s not a bad singer, but I don’t think he’s good enough vocally to carry the majority of an album through singing. Some of the singing tracks were pretty good though; not too fond of the majority of them though. They just aren’t entertaining. “Songs like “Flight of the Navigator” only somewhat gets saved by the beat. If I was high, I’d probably enjoy this song, but I’m not, sooo…yeahh… (. _ . )

The last two tracks get me back into the album. On “Earth: The World’s Oldest Computer” he links up with Azaelia Banks’ bitter ass to make an atmospheric track with some kinda techno, dance beat in the background. Some shit you’d hear at a rave, dancing with glow sticks n whatnot. I fuck with it. The closing song, “Life: The Biggest Troll”, served its purpose, and closed out the album pretty well. He goes from this dead, depressed sounding delivery to a more energetic, yet still stressed delivery. He’s kinda venting, and just talking about stuff on his mind. It makes more sense after you read the screenplay. This is one of the best songs on here. In a way he’s right; life is a troll.

Because the Internet had a couple of songs that I don’t care for (“Worldstar”, some of the singing songs) but it’s good overall. Definitely a step up from Royalty. I like it.

Rating: 7.6/10