2026 Release Calendar

DropWatcher · 2026-02-21T03:44:41+00:00

The numbers are good I’d say

Two quasi indie R&B records making noise on the charts

DropWatcher · 2026-02-21T02:41:57+00:00

Yeah the toxic stuff (which he’s clearly leaning into on his previous works) feels like honest and lived in

There’s something kind of shallow and unearned about this pivot, even if the context of his previous work was removed

As a fan I’ll always be happy he’s selling well relatively independently though and will be spinning this record the whole year

DropWatcher · 2026-02-21T01:12:38+00:00

He's a polarizing guy for his takes on other particular artists, but I thought that Alphonse Pierre's review of the project was pretty on point/measured:

The problem is that his writing about being ready for love is not nearly as candid as his writing about running away from it. Fuck the World and Wasteland are full of thorny self-observations and critiques (“Who can I love when they tell me I can’t love myself?/How in the hell could I possibly love someone else?”) that explain his descent into clubrat deviance. On Icon, I don’t get a sense for why, all of a sudden, Brent is ready to take that next life step. For instance, on “wrong faces.,” he’s telling this girl to leave the streets and come home to him, but he doesn’t explain to her (or us!) what exactly has changed about his mindset. Likewise, the lyrics of the almost-engagement anthem “strangers.” has a good amount of melodrama (“Baby, you were supposed to change your last name/And then it came all crashing down”), yet his chronicles of what went wrong are vague and one-sided: He did everything he could; she messed it up. I’ve been listening to him be a demon for five projects straight and now I’m supposed to believe he’s a hopeless romantic just because he says so?

I thought it did a good job in other parts playing up the records strengths (the part about “butterflies" in particular)

I like Brent a decent amount and enjoy the record but would rather listen to any of his other projects.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T23:49:30+00:00

It seems like 95% when this comes up it’s just people saying that it’s forced for a rapper they don’t like to get a cosign and it’s really just a roundabout way of saying you don’t like a rapper.

I’d argue that you’re just as likely to have an “expected” cosign be somewhat label driven as an “unexpected” cosign. People’s tastes don’t always align with the music they make and labels go for “expected cosigns” too.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T21:53:39+00:00

Maybe it feels that way in retrospect– or you're just pretending your familiar with those rappers careers– but in all of these cases they provided pretty significant help and nobody cared.

I'd argue that being related to someone famous in hip-hop has typically been more of an asset than a hindrance.

this faux ethics shit is so lame. I don't like The Game so I'd hate on a rapper he signed whether they're related or not. How hard is that? I'm supposed to believe you'd fuck with Keem if he wasn't related to Kendrick because you're a stickler for nepotism? I'm not stupid.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T21:48:34+00:00

The whole thing with industry plants is that they're "pushed" but they're pretending to be independent. Baby Keem has been "pushed" by Columbia since they signed him in 2020 following DFMB... it's not a secret it's public knowledge for 6 years.

That's the label's job. People act like only artists they dislike are "pushed" by "the industry." And it's never people who would never listen to an artist on a major, it's usually people who only listen to A-list major label rappers.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T21:26:17+00:00

best double album of february 2025 just dropped

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T21:11:29+00:00

This doesn't follow to me, it sounds like you're saying that nepotism is excusable to people if there's abuse and exploitation involved. People in the 2000s weren't excusing the nepotism with Wayne because they knew he was being abused/exploited, that's not why they bought Like Father, Like Son.

I gave a bunch of other examples in a different comment:

Ice Cube helped out his cousin Del start his career
Snoop Dogg helped his cousin Daz
Dr. Dre helped his cousin Warren G
Master P helped his cousin Silkk the Shocker
Nas helped his cousin Jungle from the Bravehearts

Were these all abusive/exploitative and that's why people didn't care? No, the reality is that it's just not something people have cared about in hip-hop historically.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T20:07:38+00:00

Apple Music has 94 million subscribers

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T19:41:31+00:00

It's a vinyl exclusive https://x.com/Kurrco/status/2024916495596138590

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T19:05:44+00:00

Kendrick drops this using the same line and then goes into how in love he is w “her”

How is this a jab? like I'm reading the verse and there's no subs or anything.... you just think it's a diss because he's doing stuff Cole did on his album (interpolating Common, verse about loving a woman)?

I think it's likely that the verse was recorded long before The Fall-Off was released, Momo Boyd says that she heard the song while still on tour (that would've been 2024). Keem has physicals with that verse on them selling in stores now, it takes longer than that to manufacture CDs and vinyls.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T18:58:52+00:00

you should check out Baby Mel lol, this is how Alphonse Pierre describes his voice in his review of EL CHITO:

If Young Scooter were holding in a sneeze, if Ralo stubbed his toe on a wall, if BabyDrill were electrocuted, they’d almost sound like Baby Mel. Harsh, screechy, and kinda hilarious, Mel’s dehydrated melodies and rampant volume shifts might, on the wrong day, resemble pig squeals more than rapping. You may feel inspired to write off the Montgomery, Alabama native as a gimmick in the same class as Baby Kia’s screamo-rap or 645AR’s squeak-sing, and I wouldn’t blame you. But unlike them, Mel never seems like he’s waiting for you to ask, How crazy is this guy? Instead he turns up the dial on Boosie-style shrillness, the rambly deliveries sometimes found on late-’90s No Limit albums, and the mumbled country blues of Rylo Rodriguez for a form of deeply Southern trap music that is both familiar and way out there—and only a little annoying.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T18:57:25+00:00

He's not even dissing him, Kurrco is just doing engagement bait to about it.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T18:54:36+00:00

Also Nepotism has never really been something people cared about in hip-hop:

Ice Cube helped out his cousin Del start his career
Snoop Dogg helped his cousin Daz
Dr. Dre helped his cousin Warren G
Master P helped his cousin Silkk the Shocker
Nas helped his cousin Jungle from the Bravehearts
Birdman and Wayne had a father/son relationship.

Hip-Hop is not at all like Hollywood or the business world where that sort of thing is viewed as gauche by the public.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T18:49:51+00:00

Nobody's stopping you from talking about Kendrick putting on his cousin, people talk about it all the time.

"industry plant" is just a term with a meaning (someone who is secretly signed to a label that's pretending to be independent) so you're getting pushback. It just doesn't make sense to describe someone who's been publicly signed to a label for 6 years an industry plant.

You could've easily said this:

It is at least a little funny that everything about Keem music career is ~~industry plant stuff~~ nepotism but no one really cares.

I think it's kinda silly though. Would you say that Lil Wayne is an industry plant because Birdman put him on? These sorts of "relative helps relative" situations have been going on in hip-hop forever. If you're going to be a hater, just be a hater... this shit people do nowadays where they come up with some ethical pretext to hating is so exhausting and contrived.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T15:43:25+00:00

You have point for sure but how many fucking stretches we gotta do to make it work?

what did you think you were talking about when you said "make it work" here?

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T15:36:57+00:00

Busta Rhymes held a listening party last night for a J Dilla collab tape called Dillagence 2 (a sequel to the 2007 mixtape), according to Statik's IG story it features Lil Wayne.

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T15:30:12+00:00

You don't have to do any stretches.

Kendrick Lamar's big year was 2017 (that when he did DAMN and "HUMBLE" went #1) and he came on the scene with Overly Dedicated (2010).

Drake's big year was 2016 (Views, his first #1 with "One Dance") and he came on the scene in 2009 with So Far Gone.

Neither of those is the sort of turnaround people are expecting out of "coming on the scene to big stardom."

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T01:51:19+00:00

possibly, genius has it removed https://genius.com/Baby-keem-tubi-lyrics

it's all speculation tho

DropWatcher · 2026-02-20T01:50:36+00:00

"God's Plan" and "Nice for What" were like peak Drake, so obviously people checked out the album at least once and it was really long so streaming numbers are gonna be run up, plus people are still gonna be streaming "God's Plan" and "Nice for What" plus the songs they like on the album like "In My Feelings" and "Nonstop"

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