did lil yachty live in michigan

Lil Yachty shows love for Detroit, Flint artists with 'Michigan Boy Boat'

Lil Yachty is putting Michigan on his back. Or at least in his boat. 

The Atlanta rapper on Friday released "Michigan Boy Boat," his new mixtape featuring collaborations with a slew of Michigan rappers, including Detroit artists Tee Grizzley, Veeze, Baby Smoove, BabyTron, Babyface Ray and Sada Baby, as well as Flint MCs Louie Ray, RMC Mike and Rio da Yung OG. 

"I found a love for Michigan... it's just a vibe that's unmatched," Yachty said in a video announcing the project. He said his goal with the 14-track mixtape is to put Michigan artists on a pedestal, to "give them a platform that they may not have had before," he says. "It's nothing but love, and I just want to see these guys win." 

Yachty, 23, has been teaming with rappers from the Mitten State since he linked up with Tee Grizzley for 2017's "From the D to the A," the video for which has been viewed more than 82 million times. 

Listen to "Michigan Boy Boat" here. 

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How Lil Yachty Ended Up at His Excellent New Psychedelic Album Let's Start Here

By Brady Brickner-Wood

The evening before Lil Yachty released his fifth studio album,  Let’s Start Here,  he  gathered an IMAX theater’s worth of his fans and famous friends at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City and made something clear: He wanted to be taken seriously. Not just as a “Soundcloud rapper, not some mumble rapper, not some guy that just made one hit,” he told the crowd before pressing play on his album. “I wanted to be taken serious because music is everything to me.” 

There’s a spotty history of rappers making dramatic stylistic pivots, a history Yachty now joins with  Let’s Start Here,  a funk-flecked psychedelic rock album. But unlike other notable rap-to-rock faceplants—Kid Cudi’s  Speedin’ Bullet 2 Heaven  comes to mind, as does Lil Wayne’s  Rebirth —the record avoids hackneyed pastiche and gratuitous playacting and cash-grabbing crossover singles; instead, Yachty sounds unbridled and free, a rapper creatively liberated from the strictures of mainstream hip-hop. Long an oddball who’s delighted in defying traditional rap ethos and expectations,  Let’s Start Here  is a maximalist and multi-genre undertaking that rewrites the narrative of Yachty’s curious career trajectory. 

Admittedly, it’d be easy to write off the album as Tame Impala karaoke, a gimmicky record from a guy who heard Yves Tumor once and thought: Let’s do  that . But set aside your Yachty skepticism and probe the album’s surface a touch deeper. While the arrangements tend toward the obvious, the record remains an intricate, unraveling swell of sumptuous live instruments and reverb-drenched textures made more impressive by the fact that Yachty co-produced every song. Fielding support from an all-star cast of characters, including production work from former Chairlift member Patrick Wimberly, Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Jacob Portrait, Justin Raisen, Nick Hakim, and Magdalena Bay, and vocals from Daniel Caesar, Diana Gordon,  Foushée , Justine Skye, and Teezo Touchdown, Yachty surrounds himself with a group of disparately talented collaborators. You can hear the acute attention to detail and wide-scale ambition in the spaced-out denouement on “We Saw the Sun!” or on the blistering terror of “I’ve Officially Lost Vision!!!!” or during the cool romanticism of “Say Something.” Though occasionally overindulgent,  Let’s Start Here  is a spectacular statement from hip-hop’s prevailing weirdo. It’s not shocking that Yachty took another hard left—but how exactly did he end up  here ?

In 2016, as the forefather of “bubblegum trap” ascended into mainstream consciousness, an achievement like  Let’s Start Here  would’ve seemed inconceivable. The then 18-year-old Yachty gained national attention when a pair of his songs, “One Night” and “Minnesota,” went viral. Though clearly indebted to hip-hop trailblazers Lil B, Chief Keef, and Young Thug, his work instantly stood apart from the gritted-teeth toughness of his Atlanta trap contemporaries. Yachty flaunted a childlike awe and cartoonish demeanor that communicated a swaggering, unbothered cool. His singsong flows and campy melodies contained a winking humor to them, a subversive playfulness that endeared him to a generation of very online kids who saw themselves in Yachty’s goofy, eccentric persona. He starred in Sprite  commercials alongside LeBron James, performed live shows at the  Museum of Modern Art , and modeled in Kanye West’s  Life of Pablo  listening event at Madison Square Garden. Relishing in his cultural influence, he declared to the  New York Times  that he was not a rapper but an  artist. “And I’m more than an artist,” he added. “I’m a brand.”

 As Sheldon Pearce pointed out in his Pitchfork  review of Yachty’s 2016 mixtape,  Lil Boat , “There isn’t a single thing Lil Yachty’s doing that someone else isn’t doing better, and in richer details.” He wasn’t wrong. While Yachty’s songs were charming and catchy (and, sometimes, convincing), his music was often tangential to his brand. What was the point of rapping as sharply as the Migos or singing as intensely as Trippie Redd when you’d inked deals with Nautica and Target, possessed a sixth-sense for going viral, and had incoming collaborations with Katy Perry and Carly Rae Jepsen? What mattered more was his presentation: the candy-red hair and beaded braids, the spectacular smile that showed rows of rainbow-bedazzled grills, the wobbly, weak falsetto that defaulted to a chintzy nursery rhyme cadence. He didn’t need technical ability or historical reverence to become a celebrity; he was a meme brought to life, the personification of hip-hop’s growing generational divide, a sudden star who, like so many other Soundcloud acts, seemed destined to crash and burn after a fleeting moment in the sun.

 One problem: the music wasn’t very good. Yachty’s debut album, 2017’s  Teenage Emotions, was a glitter-bomb of pop-rap explorations that floundered with shaky hooks and schmaltzy swings at crossover hits. Worse, his novelty began to fade, those sparkly, cheerful, and puerile bubblegum trap songs aging like day-old french fries. Even when he hued closer to hard-nosed rap on 2018’s  Lil Boat 2  and  Nuthin’ 2 Prove,  you could feel Yachty desperate to recapture the magic that once came so easily to him. But rap years are like dog years, and by 2020, Yachty no longer seemed so radically weird. He was an established rapper making mid mainstream rap. The only question now was whether we’d already seen the best of him.

If his next moves were any indication—writing the  theme song to the  Saved by the Bell  sitcom revival and announcing his involvement in an upcoming  movie based on the card game Uno—then the answer was yes. But in April 2021, Yachty dropped  Michigan Boat Boy,  a mixtape that saw him swapping conventional trap for Detroit and Flint’s fast-paced beats and plain-spoken flows. Never fully of a piece with his Atlanta colleagues, Yachty found a cohort of kindred spirits in Michigan, a troop of rappers whose humor, imagination, and debauchery matched his own. From the  looks of it, leaders in the scene like Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG, and YN Jay embraced Yachty with open arms, and  Michigan Boat Boy  thrives off that communion. 

 Then “ Poland ” happened. When Yachty uploaded the minute-and-a-half long track to Soundcloud a few months back, he received an unlikely and much needed jolt. Building off the rage rap production he played with on the  Birthday Mix 6  EP, “Poland” finds Yachty’s warbling about carrying pharmaceutical-grade cough syrup across international borders, a conceit that captured the imagination of TikTok and beyond. Recorded as a joke and released only after a leaked version went viral, the song has since amassed over a hundred-millions streams across all platforms. With his co-production flourishes (and adlibs) splattered across Drake and 21 Savage’s  Her Loss,  fans had reason to believe that Yachty’s creative potential had finally clicked into focus.

 But  Let’s Start Here  sounds nothing like “Poland”—in fact, the song doesn’t even appear on the project. Instead, amid a tapestry of scabrous guitars, searing bass, and vibrant drums, Yachty sounds right at home on this psych-rock spectacle of an album. He rarely raps, but his singing often relies on the virtues of his rapping: those greased-vowel deliveries and unrushed cadences, the autotune-sheathed vibrato. “Pretty,” for instance, is decidedly  not  a rap song—but what is it, then? It’s indebted to trap as much as it is ’90s R&B and MGMT, its drugged-out drums and warm keys able to house an indeterminate amount of ideas.

Yachty didn’t need to abandon hip-hop to find himself as an artist, but his experimental impulses helped him craft his first great album. Perhaps this is his lone dalliance in psych rock—maybe a return to trap is imminent. Or, maybe, he’ll make another 180, or venture deeper into the dystopia of corporate sponsorships. Who’s to say? For now, it’s invigorating to see Yachty shake loose the baggage of his teenage virality and emerge more fully into his adult artistic identity. His guise as a boundary-pushing rockstar isn’t a new archetype, but it’s an archetype he’s infused with his glittery idiosyncrasies. And look what he’s done: he’s once again morphed into a star the world didn’t see coming.

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Michigan Boy Boat

By Alphonse Pierre

Quality Control / Motown

April 28, 2021

There has never been a bag Lil Yachty won’t shamelessly chase. Since the Atlanta rapper arrived in 2016 with his melodic mixtape Lil Boat , he has been equally known for brand shilling as his music. He hit a two-step with Carly Rae Jepsen in a Target ad . He reworked the lyrics for his grating breakout single “Minnesota” for a Sprite commercial . He devised a cursed Chef Boyardee jingle with Donny Osmond. He might have recorded the worst television theme song of all time. Currently he’s working on a movie based around the card game Uno. It’s a reflection of the current climate, where almost any rapper eligible to appear on the top three lines of a Rolling Loud bill is a brand.

It’s because of all this that I was initially skeptical of his longtime intermingling with the shit-talking characters of Michigan’s thriving street rap scene . Was he using them to make his music cool again? Or was this a genuine connection with a fast-growing movement that has long been underappreciated? Likely it was a bit of both. Songs like last year’s “Flintana” (with the animated Flint rappers RMC Mike , YN Jay , and Louie Ray ) and “Not Regular” (with Detroit’s robot-dancing Sada Baby ) not only revived Yachty as a rapper but also raised the profile of Michigan rap.

Yachty’s new mixtape, Michigan Boy Boat , is an earned celebration of this fruitful relationship. Though it’s important not to position Yachty as Michigan’s rap savior—the music in both Detroit and Flint is so singular that it would have ended up in Atlanta anyway—Yachty has undeniably helped speed up the process. The chemistry Yachty has built with many of the scene’s rappers is real. Yachty sounds comfortable on the posse cut “This That One,” among the patented darkly funny punchlines, grim piano melody, booming drums, and ominous church bells, but he is not the center of attention. He’s more like a host that paves the way for his compelling guests: KrispyLife Kidd beat a dude so bad he thought he got jumped, and YN Jay is selling dope to a customer who has a bald head like Bobby Lashley . Similarly on “Plastic,” Yachty takes a backseat to Eastside Detroit’s Icewear Vezzo and Flint’s Rio Da Yung OG : “My shooter got ADHD, he’ll kill you for a script of Addys/I was finna fuck my bitch mom, but I can hit the granny,” raps Rio, maybe the most unnecesarily batshit consecutive lines on a mixtape full of them.

But the mixtape struggles when the focus shifts to Yachty. He doesn’t have Mike’s commanding voice or Rio’s recklessness, the laid-back swag of Babyface Ray or the out-of-pocket insanity of YN Jay. It’s less noticeable when he’s bouncing off of them, but glaring on solo songs like “Final Form” and “Concrete Goonies,” which are tolerable only because of dynamic beats from mainstays of the scene Helluva and Enrgy. When Yachty invites Swae Lee into this world on “Never Did Coke,” it goes about as badly as when a melodic teenage rapper shows up on a radio freestyle show and they play a DJ Premier beat.

Sprinkled across the 14 tracks are moments where Yachty sounds at home: “How the hell is niggas gangsters graduatin’ from St. John’s?” he asks on “Hybrid,” and on “Dynamic Duo,” he raps “My old bitch was really old, born in ’86,” sending all the ’80s babies into an early mid-life crisis. His best performance of all is on “G.I. Joe,” which coincidentally is the only track on the tape not rooted in the Michigan style.

If you’re already familiar with the state’s street rap movement, Michigan Boy Boat doesn’t add anything new. It’ll be a real success if it leads new fans toward superior modern mixtapes like Babyface Ray’s MIA Season 2 , Rio Da Yung OG’s City on My Back , Drego and Beno ’s Sorry For the Get Off , Los ’ G Shit Vol. 1 , BandGang Lonnie Bands ’ KOD , and more. But for anyone searching for an entry point, it’s a fun introduction to the fast-paced instrumentals, unpredictable flows, and demented punchlines synyonmous with Detroit and Flint.

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Lil Yachty Announces New Mixtape ‘Michigan Boy Boat’

By Emily Zemler

Emily Zemler

Lil Yachty will release a new mixtape, Michigan Boy Boat , on April 23rd. The rapper teased the songs in a trailer on Instagram, which showcases him paying homage to his state.

“Folks always ask me like, ‘What’s your thing with them? You know, Detroit dawgs?'” Lil Yachty says in the clip. “You know, ‘Why you doing all this?’ I found a love for Michigan, you know what I’m saying.” He adds that he’s trying to put his fellow Michigan rappers “on a pedestal” and “give them a platform that they may have not had before.”

View this post on Instagram A post shared by ^CONCRETE BOY BOAT^ 👷🏾 (@lilyachty)

The mixtape will feature up-and-coming rappers from Detroit and Flint, although Lil Yachty has yet to reveal the official tracklist.

It’s time to rap guys 4-23-21 pic.twitter.com/1XdvyPoZRE — concrete boy boat (@lilyachty) April 21, 2021

“I started doing my own homework and digging,” Yachty recently told Rolling Stone of the mixtape. “And just started realizing there are no bad rappers in Michigan. Everyone knows how to rap.”

Earlier this year, Lil Yachty released “Royal Rumble,” which features six MCs from Michigan’s rap scenes: Krispylife Kid, RMC Mike, Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG, DC2Trill, and Icewear Vezzo. It’s likely the track will appear on Michigan Boy Boat .

Lil Yachty’s last proper release was his fourth  studio album,  Lil Boat 3 , which arrived last May. Last August, he released Birthday Mix 5 , continuing the tradition of dropping a batch of new songs to mark his birthday.

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Lil Yachty Sets Sail With ‘Michigan Boy Boat’ Mixtape: Stream It Now

The new set spans 14 songs and welcomes a boatload of new faces from the Great Lakes state, including Sada Baby, Babyface Ray, Rmc Mike and more.

By Billboard Staff

Billboard Staff

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Lil Yachty sails in with a mixtape, Michigan Boy Boat.

Arriving at the stroke of midnight, the new set spans 14 songs and welcomes a boatload of new faces from the Great Lakes state, including Sada Baby, Babyface Ray, Rmc Mike and more.

Lil Yachty & Mattel Team Up for Action Comedy Film Based on Card Game Uno

Yachty has a hankering for all-things Michigan. “I found a love for Michigan, you know what I’m sayin’? The city itself is just a vibe that’s unmatched,” he says in video posted online earlier in the week.

“I established this relationship, I was a fan of all these guys all throughout Michigan, not just Detroit,” he continues. “Tryna put them on a pedestal. Give ’em the platform they may not have had before.”

See latest videos, charts and news

  View this post on Instagram   A post shared by ^CONCRETE BOY BOAT^ (@lilyachty)

Michigan Boy Boat is the followup to his 2020 studio album Lil Boat 3, which peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard 200. The Georgia rapper’s last mixtape was 2016’s Summer Songs 2 .

Stream Michigan Boy Boat below.

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Lil Yachty reveals ‘Michigan Boy Boat’

• April 22, 2021
• Notable Releases , Rap/Hip Hop

Album drops Apr 23rd

Lil Yachty reveals the artwork and April 23rd release date for his highly-anticipated mixtape Michigan Boy Boat . Featuring rappers from Detroit and Flint, Yachty unveiled a behind-the-scenes trailer filmed in the Great Lake State.

The rapper has long been collaborating with Michiganders. Since his 2017 Tee Grizzley collaboration “From the D to the A,” Yachty has been featured on songs with Michigan artists Sada Baby, YN Jay, RNC Mike, and Krispylife Kitdd. And these were only primers.

In February Lil Yachty released a video for his song, “Royal Rumble,” which features six MCs from Michigan’s vibrant rap scenes (along with Yachty, the song boasts Krispylife Kid, RMC Mike, Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG and Icewear Vezzo).

Lil Yachty has been busy. In between developing a heist movie based on the card game Uno, a series for HBO Max, diving into crypto currency, partnering with Reese’s Puffs cereal, remixing the Saved by the Bell theme song, and becoming a favorite on TikTok.

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Lil Yachty Drops New Mixtape 'Michigan Boy Boat' f/ Tee Grizzley, Sada Baby, and More

While Lil Yachty is from Atlanta, Georgia, the rapper is seeking inspiration from elsewhere for his highly anticipated new mixtape, 'Michigan Boy Boat​​​​​​​.'

View this video on YouTube

While Lil Yachty is from Atlanta, Georgia, the rapper is seeking inspiration from elsewhere for his highly anticipated new mixtape,  Michigan Boy Boat .

His first mixtape since 2016’s  Summer Songs 2 , and the follow-up to his 2020 album  Lil Boat 3 ,  Michigan Boy Boat  sees Yachty team-up with some of Michigan’s best. Featuring collaborations with the likes of Tee Grizzley, Swae Lee, Veeze, and Sada Baby among others, the tape is something he’s been teasing since October. 

“Man folks always ask me, ‘What’s your thing with them, you know, Detroit dawgs? You know, why you doing all this?’” he said in a trailer for the project. “I found a love for Michigan. The city [Detroit] itself is just a vibe that’s unmatched. I established this relationship… This fam with all these guys all throughout Michigan, not just Detroit. Trynna put them on a pedestal, give them a platform they may have not had before.”

View this photo on Instagram

In a recent interview with Complex , Yachty said he first got plugged in with the Michigan rap scene in 2016 through Pablo Skywalkin. When it came to make the project, he reached out to these underground rappers and producers, and said he “wasn’t afraid to show love, and I wanted to work with all of them.” 

Listen to the project in full above and watch the video for “Stunt Double” featuring Rio Da Yung OG up top.

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Guest artists include Tee Grizzley, Sada Baby, Babyface Ray, Louis Ray, YN Jay, RMC Mike, Veeze, Baby Smoove, Icewear Vezzo, Rio Da Yung OG, and Slap Savage.

Published on

Today Lil Yachty has shared his highly-anticipated mixtape Michigan Boy Boat . The long-awaited 14-track offering features a comprehensive who’s who of rappers from Detroit and Flint including Tee Grizzley, Sada Baby, Babyface Ray, Louis Ray, YN Jay, RMC Mike, Veeze, Baby Smoove, Icewear Vezzo, Rio Da Yung OG, Baby Tron, Krispy Life Kidd, and Slap Savage. On Wednesday, Yachty unveiled a behind-the-scenes trailer filmed in the Great Lake State.

Lil Yachty is coming off a major year in 2020, capping the Lil Boat trilogy that put him on the map with Lil Boat 3 and the subsequent deluxe album LB3.5 . He has since been outspoken about his support of the Michigan rap scene, with the midwest style energizing the rapper to create a project that marks a new chapter in his career.

In February, Lil Yachty released a video for his song, “Royal Rumble,” which featured several MCs from Michigan’s vibrant rap scenes including Krispylife Kid, RMC Mike, Babyface Ray, Rio Da Yung OG, and Icewear Vezzo.

Alongside the new mixtape, Lil Yachty has been busy developing a heist movie based on the card game Uno, a series for HBO Max, diving into cryptocurrency, partnering with Reese’s Puffs cereal, remixing the Saved by the Bell theme song, and becoming a favorite on TikTok . Suffice it to say, Lil Yachty’s focused on big things in 2021.

Lil Yachty’s Michigan Boy Boat is out now and available for purchase here.

Michigan Boy Boat Tracklist:

1. Final Form 2. Dynamic Duo Ft. Tee Grizzley 3. Concrete Goonies 4. Don’t Even Bother Ft. Veeze & Baby Smoove 5. G.I. Joe Ft. Louie Ray 6. Never Did Coke Ft. Swae Lee 7. Ghetto Boy Shit Ft. RMC Mike 8. Plastic Ft. Icewear Vezzo & Rio Da Yung OG 9. Fight Night Round 3 Ft. Babyface Ray & Veeze 10. SB 2021 Ft. Sada Baby 11. Stunt Double Ft. Rio Da Yung OG 12. SB5 Ft. Sada Baby 13. Hybrid Ft. Baby Tron 14. This That One Ft. Krispy Life Kidd, Veeze, Slap Savage, YN Jay, Louie Ray

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Music Features

Lil yachty's delightfully absurd path to 'let's start here'.

Matthew Ramirez

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 29: Lil Yachty performs on the Stage during day 2 of Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival 2017 at Exposition Park on October 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. Rich Fury/Getty Images hide caption

LOS ANGELES, CA - OCTOBER 29: Lil Yachty performs on the Stage during day 2 of Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival 2017 at Exposition Park on October 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California.

Lil Yachty often worked better as an idea than a rapper. The late-decade morass of grifters like Lil Pump, amidst the self-serious reign of Future and Drake (eventual Yachty collaborators, for what it's worth), created a demand for something lighter, someone charismatic, a throwback to a time in the culture when characters like Biz Markie could score a hit or Kool Keith could sustain a career in one hyper-specific lane of rap fandom. Yachty fulfilled the role: His introduction to many was through a comedy skit soundtracked by his viral breakout "1 Night," which tapped into the song's deadpan delivery and was the perfect complement for its sleepy charm. The casual fan knows him best for a pair of collaborations in 2016: as one-half of the zeitgeist-defining single "Broccoli" with oddity D.R.A.M., or "iSpy," a top-five pop hit with backpack rapper Kyle. Yachty embodied the rapper as larger-than-life character — from his candy-colored braids to his winning smile — and while the songs themselves were interesting, you could be forgiven for wondering if there was anything substantial behind the fun, the grounds for the start of a long career.

As if to supplement his résumé, Yachty seemed to emerge as a multimedia star. Perhaps you remember him in a Target commercial; heard him during the credits for the Saved by the Bell reboot; spotted him on a cereal box; saw him co-starring in the ill-fated 2019 sequel to How High . TikTok microcelebrity followed. Then the sentences got more and more absurd: Chef Boyardee jingle with Donny Osmond; nine-minute video cosplaying as Oprah; lead actor in an UNO card game movie. Somewhere in a cross-section of pop-culture detritus and genuine hit-making talent is where Yachty resides. That he didn't fade away immediately is a testament to his charm as a cultural figure; Yachty satisfied a need, and in his refreshingly low-stakes appeal, you could imagine him as an MTV star in an alternate universe. Move the yardstick of cultural cachet from album sales to likes and he emerges as a generation-defining persona, if not musician.

Early success and exposure can threaten anyone's career, none so much as those connected to the precarious phenomenon of SoundCloud rap. Yachty's initial peak perhaps seeded his desire years later to sincerely pursue artistry with Let's Start Here , an album fit for his peculiar trajectory, because throughout the checks from Sprite and scolding Ebro interviews he never stopped releasing music, seemingly to satisfy no one other than himself and the generation of misfits that he seemed to be speaking for.

But to oversell him as a personality belittles his substantial catalog. Early mixtapes like Lil Boat and Summer Songs 2 , which prophetically brought rap tropes and pop sounds into harmony, were sustained by the teenage artist's commitment to selling the vibe of a track as he warbled its memorable hook. It was perhaps his insistence to demonstrate that he could rap, too, that most consistently pockmarked his output during this period. These misses were the necessary growing pains of a kid still finding his footing, and through time and persistence, a perceived weakness became a strength. Where his peers Lil Uzi Vert and Playboi Carti found new ways to express themselves in music, Yachty dug in his heels and became Quality Control's oddball representative, acquitting himself on guest appearances and graduating from punchline rapper to respectable vet culminating in the dense and rewarding Lil Boat 3 from 2020, Yachty's last official album.

Which is why the buzzy, viral "Poland" from the end of 2022 hit different — Yachty tapped back into the same lively tenor of his early breakthroughs. The vibrato was on ten, the beat menaced and hummed like a broken heater, he rapped about taking cough syrup in Poland, it was over in under two minutes and endlessly replayable. Yachty has already lived a full career arc in seven years — from the 2016 king of the teens, to budding superstar, to pitchman, to regional ambassador. But following "Poland" with self-aware attempts at similar virality would be a mistake, and you can't pivot your way to radio stardom after a hit like that, unless you're a marketing genius like Lil Nas X. How does he follow up his improbable second chance to grab the zeitgeist?

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Lil yachty, 'poland'.

Let's Start Here is Lil Yachty's reinvention, a born-again Artist's Statement with no rapping. It's billed as psychedelic rock but has a decidedly accessible sound — the sun-kissed warmth of an agreeable Tame Impala song, with bounce-house rhythms and woozy guitars in the mode of Magdalena Bay and Mac DeMarco (both of whom guest on the album) — something that's not quite challenging but satisfying nonetheless. Contrast with 2021's Michigan Boy Boat , where Yachty performed as tour guide through Michigan rap: His presence was auxiliary by function on that tape, as he ceded the floor to Babyface Ray, Sada Baby and Rio Da Yung OG; it was tantalizing curation, if not a work of his own personal artistry. It's tempting to cast Let's Start Here as another act of roleplay, but what holds this album together is Yachty's magnetic pull. Whether or not you're someone who voluntarily listens to the Urban Outfitters-approved slate of artists he's drawing upon, his star presence is what keeps you engaged here.

Yachty has been in the studio recording this album since 2021, and the effort is tangible. He didn't chase "Poland" with more goofy novelties, but he also didn't spit this record out in a month. Opener (and highlight) "The Black Seminole" alternates between Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix-lite references. It's definitely a gauntlet thrown even if halfway through you start to wonder where Yachty is. The album's production team mostly consists of Patrick Wemberly (formerly of Chairlift), Jacob Portrait (of Unknown Mortal Orchestra), Jeremiah Raisen (who's produced for Charli XCX, Sky Ferreira and Drake) and Yachty himself, who's established himself as a talented producer since his early days. (MGMT's Ben Goldwasser also contributed.) The group does a formidable job composing music that is dense and layered enough to register as formally unconventional, if not exactly boundary-pushing. Yachty frequently reaches for his "Poland"-inspired uber-vibrato, which adds a bewitching texture to the songs, placing him in the center of the track. Other moments that work: the spoken-word interlude "Failure," thanks to contemplative strumming from Alex G, and "The Ride," a warm slow-burn that coasts on a Jam City beat, giving the album a lustrous Night Slugs moment. "I've Officially Lost Vision" thrashes like Yves Tumor.

Yet the best songs on Let's Start Here push Yachty's knack for hooks and snaking melodies to the fore and rely less on studio fireworks — the laid-back groove of "Running Out of Time," the mournful post-punk of "Should I B?" and the slow burn of "Pretty," which features a bombastic turn from vocalist Foushee. That Yachty's vaunted indie collaborators were able to work in simpatico with him proves his left-of-center bonafides. It's a reminder that he's often lined his projects with successful non-rap songs, curios like "Love Me Forever" from Lil Boat 2 and "Worth It" from Nuthin' 2 Prove . That renders Let's Start Here a less startling turn than it may appear at first glance, and also underlines his recurring talent for making off-kilter pop music, a gift no matter the perceived genre.

At a listening event for the record, Yachty stated: "I created [this] because I really wanted to be taken seriously as an artist. Not just some SoundCloud rapper, not some mumble rapper. Not some guy that just made one hit," seemingly aware of the culture war within his own genre and his place along the spectrum of low- to highbrow. To be sure, whether conscious of it or not, this kind of mentality is dismissive of rap music as an artform, and also undermines the good music Yachty has made in the past. Holing up in the studio to make digestibly "weird" indie-rock with a cast of talented white people isn't intrinsically more artistic or valid than viral hits or a one-off like "Poland." But this statement scans less as self-loathing and more as a renewed confidence, a tribute to the album's collective vision. And people like Joe Budden have been saying "I don't think Yachty is hip-hop " since he started. So what if he wants to break rank now?

Lil Yachty entered the cultural stage at 18, and has grown up in public. It adds up that, now 25, he would internalize all the scrutiny he's received and wish to cement his artistry after a few thankless years rewriting the rules for young, emerging rappers. Let's Start Here may not be the transcendent psychedelic rock album that he seeks, but it is reflective of an era of genreless "vibes" music. Many young listeners likely embraced Yachty and Tame Impala simultaneously; it tracks he would want to bring these sounds together in a genuine attempt to reach a wider audience. Nothing about this album is cynical, but it is opportunistic, a creation in line with both a shameless mixed-media existence and his everchanging pop alchemy. The "genre" tag in streaming metadata means less than it ever has. Credit to Yachty for putting that knowledge to use.

Michigan Boy Boat

If you let rap classicists tell it, Lil Yachty's slurred melodies and occasional flippancy betrayed a lack of reverence for the culture. But that was always more about traditionalism than rap bona fides. His malleability is ample evidence of hip-hop connoisseurship. Whether he was adopting the triple-time flow alongside Offset and Lil Baby, or flaunting a Drakeo the Ruler–esque cadence alongside Remble, Lil Boat frequently turned his own songs into tributes to regional styles and sounds. Michigan Boy Boat is the boldest example. Released in 2021, the album sees Yachty work alongside artists and producers from Detroit and Flint, MI, some of the most innovative stylists of the 2010s. Over the course of 14 songs, Yachty oscillates between production and rap styles that embody the best the state has to offer. He sounds at home whether sliding across frenetic piano or bouncy synths, and he has a knack for absorbing the stylistic tics of his collaborators. For "Final Form," he cruises a Helluva production for a flex exhibition; it's not hard to imagine Detroit luminaries 42 Dugg and Tee Grizzley lacing the track with more outward flashes of machismo. Grizzley himself joins Yachty for "Dynamic Duo," another Helluva-produced track that evokes the energy of modern D-Town. Accosting ominously rumbling keys with BabyTron on "Hybrid," Yachty adopts the Tron's descending deadpan while letting loose quippy punchlines. "SB 2021" sees Yachty jump into the more jittery side of Michigan rap, using a rambling rhythm to match both collaborator Sada Baby and the skittering percussion. On "Plastic," he joins forces with Icewear Vezzo and Rio Da Yung Og, his braggadocio capturing their plainspoken authority. It's a chameleonic act built on a level of dexterity that naysayers would say Yachty didn't possess. Pulling from aesthetics from Detroit pioneers across generations, Yachty serves up a regional tribute at the intersection of adaptability and mutual respect.

April 23, 2021 14 Songs, 40 minutes Quality Control Music/Motown Records; ℗ 2021 Quality Control Music, LLC, under exclusive license to UMG Recordings, Inc.

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Lil Yachty Delivers 'Michigan Boy Boat' Mixtape

Featuring tee grizzley, baby smoove and more..

Lil Yachty has officially dropped his newest project, Michigan Boy Boat.

Clocking in at 40 minutes, the 14-track mixtape features the likes of Tee Grizzley, Veeze, Baby Smoove, Louie Ray, Swae Lee, RMC Mike, Icewear Vezzo, Rio Da Yung OG, Babyface Ray, Sada Baby, Baby Tron and Krispy Life Kidd, Slap Savage and YN Jay. “dis 4 my second home… let’s rap..” Yachty wrote on Instagram .

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Tired of inflated ticket prices, Yungblud is launching his own affordable music festival

Sian Watson

Associated Press

Yungblud poses for portrait photographs in London, Tuesday, March 19, 2024. (Photo by Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP)

LONDON – Tired of inflated ticket prices, recording artist Yungblud is launching his own affordable music festival.

Bludfest takes place on Aug. 11 in the iconic Milton Keynes Bowl, which in the past has hosted the likes of David Bowie and Green Day in Buckinghamshire, England, northwest of London.

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Yungblud, whose real name is Dom Harrison, thinks that currently festivals are “unrepresentative of people” — so he’s fixing the price point of Bludfest at 49.50 pounds (around $63).

“It’s like massive ticket charges, massive prices that most of the time aren’t really going to the artist anyway,” he said of typical festival prices in a recent interview with The Associated Press.

He adds that music festivals are becoming inaccessible when really they should be about “having fun and making memories.”

Joining him on the bill are Lil Yachty, duo Soft Play, Nessa Barrett, Lola Young and Jazmin Bean. The Damned are also playing in an “icons” slot. Tickets for the event go on sale March 22.

Yungblud says he aims to make a “physical world” for him and his fanbase, and then “anyone else who wants to come along.”

The British star is also offering a “Make a Friend” option for fans attending alone. You can either chat before on a Discord channel, or go to the designated tent and meet people in person.

And he hopes to expand it out of the U.K. if it goes according to plan, taking the concept to different regions across the globe.

As well as Bludfest, Yungblud is also working on a new record, his fourth. In the past he’s written about darkness and depression, but says this one has a more positive tone.

“I’ve sung about the things that really hurt me in the beginning. And this new album flips over and it’s about the light. It’s about wanting to be alive and wanting to be with my friends and thinking I can get through it because these people have given me some hope,” he said.

And it’s not just his friends who give him hope — it’s also his fans.

“I really do have a strong faith in humanity in me because I see people every day and I see what they do for each other at my gigs,” he said.

Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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Lil Yachty - Michigan Boy Boat-2021

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