Lil Uzi Vert's Just Wanna Rock / 2024 Retrospective
I've given myself the task of writing about one song a week for 2024 because, well, I think it'd be fun.
Lil Uzi Vert's Just Wanna Rock
I'm genuinely interested in younger generations. I have been called condescending for asking "Do you know ..." I'm genuinely fascinated by their answers. The world I live in is not the world they live in, and I want to understand the why of their world.
As you get older, you get more defensive, more self-aware. You realize why you like things, and feel shamed. Younger folks do more doing than thinking, which is the best way to know why you like something. I am fascinated by Generation Alpha's (2012-) love for Huggy Wuggy, Momo, and Skibidi Toilet. Their fascination in horror fascinates me. I wonder if it reveals something about my generation's love for SpongeBob and Courage the Cowardly Dog, and the succeeding generation's love for Five Nights at Freddy's.
I have a friend who is of Generation Z (1997-2012). From her I learned about Laufey and aespa. I have never heard of these acts before. I also recently learned that her contemporaries have hosted listening parties for Lil Uzi Vert's "Eternal Atake 2" and ... I think Tyler the Creator's "Chromakopia"? but not Kendrick Lamar's "GNX". They clearly show where music is going, for what reason it's consumed and what it says about us and the state of the world.
One day she said, "Lil Uzi Vert's Just Wanna Rock is the anthem of my generation." Naturally I had to hear it.
The music video begins with Uzi receiving adulation from his fans in an impromptu "show" I guess. The next scene consists of Uzi rapidly bobbing his head wearing a fur trapper hat and shades, which is a really funny image. From these images proceed the title of the song: "I just wanna rock, / body in a yacht."
From there, we are given an image of a pink earth, with Uzi - or, is inferred to be Uzi - driving a monster truck to ... somewhere. The truck glows with pink light, and Uzi screams "DAAAAAAAAAAAYUUUUUUUUUM".
Uzi then mumbles, "This ain't what you want, this ain't what you want" as he half-heartedly gets on the dance floor, shaking the stiffness out of his hands in his first "look mommy no hands" moment, only to then do a half-hearted twirl. "HAH" the video cuts to Uzi screaming, followed by Uzi mumbling "I just wanna rock!"
He proceeds,
Shawty got that bo-ody ah ah ah, Hit her once, no ties, Stand up, you gon' kill my vibes, Stand on my money, don't know my size,
and Uzi does what looks like a competent windmill, except I understand video editing, and I'm not convinced that he didn't try fifty times and the editor just spliced the best parts.
As if finally realizing how embarrassing this fake "club" scene is, which in execution is not that different than Rebecca Black's "party" in "Friday", we cut to Uzi riding his truck through a city. He arises from the roof, screaming once his signature catchphrase, "DAYYYYYYYUUUUUUUM".
We then return to the mob in the beginning of the music video, and have some POV shots from the perspective of the fun-havers. These paid and unpaid extras (probably the latter) REALLY want to see Uzi gyrate in this street, even though, in reality, most New Yorkers would say "What the hell is going on down there?" and move on with their day.
"BUH BUH BUH BUH" Uzi booms, imitating gun shots, dancing his best diarrhea dance. "Dayum!" he cries.
Understandably the NYPD wants to control the crowd before it gets rowdy - we all recall what happened when some dude tried to give away PS5s in Union Square - and they go to Uzi, "Sir, you are taking up traffic in this scene, and the people who live on this street are complaining about noise, and their children have to go to school tomorrow, can you please drive this car somewhere else," to which Uzi responds, understandably, by driving his truck into outer space, thus ending the video and the song.
I realized then my friend is a moron.
What's interesting, though, about Lil Uzi Vert is his aesthetic. I got around to Lil Uzi Vert...let me see...in 2017, with his debut, "Luv Is Rage 2", entering his oeuvre particularly through "XO Tour Llif3", which is a great song. Having been Gucci Mane's protege, the music in it is dark. But Gucci Mane began rapping since the mid-2000s, around the boom or height of gangsta rap; Uzi is post-Kanye "Late Registration", the same Kanye who would be pitted against 50 Cent in 2007, and win. Thus Uzi and his audience, which I presume is comprised of younger people, have inherited a flair for the melodramatic.
Which leads to the famous declaration in "XO Tour Llif3": "All my friends are dead", meant to be looked in two ways: 1) I have no friends, 2) my only friends are dead people i.e. the people on my dollar bills. Most audience members will not empathize with 50 being shot nine times, but most audience members will empathize with Uzi's depletion of his social circle.
We can talk about Kanye's use of melodrama all day, but the important thing is that, by nature, melodrama is subjective. What I mean is, when Raekwon raps, "I grew up on the crime side, New York Times side, / stayin' alive was no jive, / at second hands, moms bounced on men / so then I moved to the Shaolin land", it's hard to deny there's real struggle depicted in those lyrics. Melodrama focuses on lower stakes, it focuses on the singer's interior feelings, rather than their exterior circumstances. Which means, by nature again, you have to overexaggerate, you have to fictionalize, you have to, in a sense, lie, but lie for a reason.
Something I hadn't mentioned: at the very end of the music video, one of the fun-havers is rinsing his face because he got pepper-sprayed, presumably by the cops(?). I don't know if this is scripted or not scripted, but my bet is that it's scripted. I mean, nothing you see in a video is real, and nothing you see in a video with this resolution and a cameraman of this steady a hand is likely to be real.
This is the perfect place for rap and emo to ally. Uzi exaggerates the heights and the downfalls of his life. In this way, he's not different than a WWE wrestler.
Which is why he's so corny.
If you're not familiar with wrestling, most people are fighting over a belt, and they really want that belt, even though it's just a fucking belt. But that's why wrestling is appealing: it mixes the pettiness of people with the nobility that comes from ambition.
I think that's why wrestling is having a resurgence. One, recently Bad Bunny appeared in Backlash. Two, the crowning of Cody Rhodes in Wrestlemania 40 was a bit of a cultural event.
With Raekwon and the rest of the Wu Tang Clan, there's a bit of voyeurism. We are interested in their stories, but we're aware we may not be able to empathize with them, only understand them. We're living in a time where we are trying to connect with the greatness and the flaws of figures. Which describes Lil Uzi Vert's aesthetic, as far as I understand it: he's corny, he's a bit of a ham, but that's okay, because his listeners are the same.
I think, particularly with the rise of social media and the constant scrutiny of one's actions, no one wants an impeccable artist anymore, but no one wants a completely loathsome, or completely tortured, artist anymore either. Here's a question: who is the DMX of this generation? Ice Cube? From "The Nigga Ya Love To Hate": "I heard payback's a motherfucking nigga, / that's why I'm sick of being treated like a goddamn stepchild; / fuck a punk, 'cause I ain't him." That's real anger and defiance there. The closest I can think of is Kendrick oddly enough, and what's interesting is that he tells you he's angry rather than actually being in his songs. Which is why I called this the decade of rhetoric when I talked about the albums of 2024.
So we're stuck somewhere in the hazy middle, where Uzi is kinda an asshole but he's tolerable enough that your parents don't mind if you wanna rock with him. I'm okay with that. I find that fascinating. Again, I'm not trying to be condescending, though I do have some misgivings. Every time is an interesting time.
Taylor Swift's You Need To Calm Down
OK, I'm getting dangerously close to becoming a Swiftie.
By the way, to clarify my relationship to Taylor Swift: I literally ignored her all the way to 2024. I'm not joking. I remember thinking the lyrics to "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" (2012) were not bad at one point in time. But I missed all the hullaballoo concerning "Lover" (2019). It's literally just now that I'm getting into her.
The funny thing about Swift's "You Need To Calm Down" is that I dreamt about the song during the night of this year's election.
That's pretty much why I want to write about the song. Oh, and I love the song. But I wrote way more about "Just Wanna Rock" than I thought I would, so I'll talk about it very briefly, such that it amounts to a review of the song rather than an actual analysis.
I talked before that Taylor sometimes delivers vocals perfectly. Once more, she delivers "You are somebody that I don't know, / but you're taking shots at me like it's Patrón" perfectly. She doesn't sound dismissive, she doesn't offended, she just sounds really, really confused, which is accentuated by the follow-up "I'm just like, Damn, / it's seven AM." The music video actually makes this interpretation worse; she's so evocative with her singing that she does better acting with her voice alone. (It's a reminder that Matt Stone struggled to get a good performance from Thom Yorke in "South Park". Emoting for the song is different than emoting for a script.) I just see her scrunch her face up and throw her head back when she says "Damn".
"Say it in the street, it's a knock-out", Taylor concedes, "but you say it in a tweet, that's a cop-out, / and I'm just like, Hey, / are you okay?"
That's why I love the song: Taylor is just really confused about what's going on. I don't get the sense that she's passing judgment on anyone, even though bones have been made about the song's relationship to the first Trump administration (song was released in 2019). Like, why me? Why are you shitting on me? I'm just trying to live my life here, buddy. That's just my opinion, dude. It's super funny, and it is my soundtrack to the end of 2024.
And so we get to the chorus, with Taylor chilling in a pool singing the title of the song, "You need to calm down, / you're being too loud." Nevermind, THIS is where she's being dismissive, but, in my older years, I realize that calming down is generally a superior alternative to any other option, so it's solid advice coming from her.
Alright, let's tackle the elephant in the room: the political subtext of the song. Namely that it's about LGBTQ+. As Esquire put it: "Equating online haters with the personal and societal struggle of LGBTQ+ people is, at best, tone deaf."
I don't know if I agree with that. This is assuming the message of a song is in relation to its lyrics. No, the message of a song is in relation to what makes it a song: the music. "You Need To Calm Down" is a great song because it's a great song. The song bumps. Taylor's delivery is wonderfully campy and funny. The highs of Taylor's "oh-oh, oh-oh, oh-OHHHHHHHHH" are divine. And I love Taylor's "Why are you mad? / When you could be GLAAD?".
Listen, it's a danceable song, but the most appealing part of the song is that it's optimistic. It doesn't take its argument by saying "You're homophobic / transphobic", it doesn't take its argument by saying "Gay people don't affect your life"; its argument is effectively, "Just shut up and party, dude." This is an excellent point. We can sit here and dwell on the messiness of life and come up with literally no solutions, or we can affirm the joys of life and be happy that we're even here in the first place. Thereby coming to the argument that it's a blessing, too, that gay, bi, queer, trans people are here too, whatever we think of them. Thus, to me, "You Need To Calm Down" is a song saying, "Let's just be glad we're here", which is a message I emphatically agree with.
People say Taylor is fake. I, until I have evidence, think Taylor is steely. I mean, who else can handle her touring schedule, the attention put on her? It doesn't hurt for us to adopt Taylor's diamond-like front, if that is indeed what it is.
On art
Well, I kinda outed myself politcally on this blog, so I'll share some of my most recent thoughts on the election for those who feel despair.
Art is living; art is expression. Art outlasts. If you want to be sure about the future, view and create art. It's as simple as that.
With the most recent election, Reagan's party is dead. The current Republican party has almost no connective tissue with the Gipper's party except possibly in policy, even though it's fairly clear the president-elect doesn't even believe in that.
But the art created in his era lives. We still know The Dead Kennedys. Reagan Youth. J. G. Ballard's "Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan". In recent times, we have Killer Mike's "Reagan". And we have "RONALD REAGAN CUT UP WHILE TALKING".
I have always believed in art more than anything. I'm always cautious about making statements like this; I fear I am trying to pass an ideological test. But this I am sure of, because I have felt everything else in my life fail me, and I have perceived despair all of my life, except concerning art. And the more I learn of art, the more reasons I find to love it.
I find this as an opportunity to turn away from the suffering and torment of our world and turn to art, not simply art as pleasure, but art as expression, art as a process, art as historical record, art as philosophy. We search for ourselves through art. That is what I want to do, for I may find a part of myself that is worthy of sharing with other people in their pain. Maybe. It'd be nice if that happened.
That being said, I'm sure something will happen that will piss me off and turn me back to reality. Poop emoji.
Retrospective
Well, with only one song left, it's time to retrospect on the song(s) of the week for 2024. I've put all of them on a playlist though the Bandcamp-specific ones, for obvious reasons, could not be added, so alternate versions were put up. I also did not add Tracy Chapman's performance of "Fast Car" with Luke Combs, even though I love it if only because you see, very briefly, a tear irradiate like a star when the stagelight strikes her eyes in the beginning.
First - well, before I start with that, I'm shocked how playlist-able the songs of the week are. I think they flow really well and I find myself listening to this playlist a lot. I probably intended that, but the fact that it works more-or-less in reality is a pleasant surprise, as I never think anything I do works (a very programmer sentiment).
First: totally never doing this again. Well, definitely not for 2025. I think anyone reading this can see I was running out of gas by, like, June. My energy resumed around the time of September because I knew exactly who I would write about, but summer was just this long nightmare. That being said, I knew it would be a nightmare; this was a fun exercise in finding my imperfections, and I think the writing largely holds up, though I wish I could have done better for the artists I truly love ex. Destroyer, Joni Mitchell.
Second: huge disappointment I covered very little jazz, rap or electronic music, the latter being quite possibly my favorite genre, amusingly enough. I literally have a list. I wanted to write about Wu Tang's "Can It All Be So Simple". Underworld's "Born Slippy". Phuture's "Your Only Friend". Coltrane's "Ascension". Derrick May's "Strings of Life". Aphex Twin's "Fingerbib". Davis' "Bitches Brew". Flying Lotus' "Do the Astral Plane". In hindsight, I could've totally written about Eno. I'm so disappointed I couldn't finish a George Clinton write-up too. So much music, just completely underrepresented. Oh, and ambient music. What, no Nurse With Wound? Merzbow? Terry Riley? Basinski? I even wrote Richard Maxfield's "Night Music" down. The problem is that I just don't know anything about music, so I struggle to write about instrumental music. Maybe next time I will actually teach myself how to read music. I don't know. Gotta compensate somehow.
Third: so basically there were only pop, rock and R&B musicians. Of them, I wrote about one the most (beyond Beyoncé week and Joni Mitchell month): Taylor Swift, "Shake It Off", "Fortnight", "You Need To Calm Down". How does that happen. Second place is shared by Elvis Costello ("Everyday I Write The Book" and "Don't Look Now") and My Chemical Romance ("I Don't Love You" and "Disenchanted"), from the same album no less. No surprise, these are greatly influential artists. Meanwhile, SZA only once. Hmm.
Fourth: for that reason, I'd totally love to do this again (thus contradicting the first bullet point). I think most of these songs were off the top of my head. I was always incentivized to write about "Everyday I Write The Book", "Fast Car", "Jealous", "Gaucho", "Mamma Mia", et cetera, and now was just the right time. I'd love to see what my list looks like now that I've gotten those songs out of the way. But, I am also tired.
One of the funnier character arcs of writing this first song-of-the-week is that, in the beginning, I reasoned to myself that I was within my rights to phone it in and say, like, five things about a song and then just submit it. I'm not entirely sure if that happened in the beginning, but by the end the word count just got longer and longer. A big part of the reason why is that the songs were just so good, and there was so much to write about, and I wouldn't have the opportunity to write about them again. Now that I think about it, though, I totally phoned in the Bruno Mars one.
Another character arc is that I loved doing this in the beginning, hated doing this by June / summer, and then came back to loving it again, but warily, from November onward. That being said, that describes my general writing pattern, which I have observed for the last ten years or so. I really don't like summer for some reason.
So...that's that. There's one more song-of-the-week, and then I'm outta here. Off to write about something else.
And if you've been following me - I literally don't check the site's statistics - thank you for accompanying me on this really weird journey.