At a time when parasocial behavior trumps religion, the kids no longer look to the sky for a deity; they scroll their phones for someone who looks like them. In the eyes of many, that godlike figure is Playboi Carti, rap’s biggest young luminary. To the Atlanta native’s diehard supporters, an arrest for alleged abuse is a call to action, his mugshot a symbol of solidarity. He’s part-novelty, part-leader of men; a master of deceit, and a villain.
Carti’s tendency to shroud himself in mystery is both the key to his allure and his audience’s biggest gripe. For them, the gap between his 2018 debut studio album Die Lit and 2020’s Whole Lotta Red was a grueling exhibition of falsities and hearsay.
Four years have now passed since the cultural reset of WLR and the demand for the rapper’s fourth full-length has reached biblical proportions. In a convoluted saga of name-changes, broken promises, and surprise singles, the album, now known as I Am Music, may be the most anticipated rap release of the decade. Here’s everything you need to know about what’s happened so far.
March 13, 2021
Playboi Carti announces his Whole Lotta Red follow-up record less than three months after its Christmas release. Under an Instagram dump of posh, snow-white ’fit pics, he types out this surprise announcement in his signature style: “LeTs dr0p thiS new Album . w3 noT done.”
August 23, 2021
In another bombshell Instagram post (there’s a lot of these), Carti shares a photo dump captioned “NARCISSIST 09/13/21,”—a project slated for his 25th birthday. This post (and two more that came days after) features a masked figure (presumably Carti) in a barren warehouse with sewing machines and naked mannequins. The pieces on display vary from dark cloaks to Rick Owens–inspired lunar boots to one fat-ass matte black biker helmet. Carti’s ambiguity creates speculation about an album, a clothing line, or both.
September 13, 2021
*nothing*
September 14, 2021
The store on playboicarti.com opens to the public with Narcissist-themed masks, bomber jackets, motorcycle gloves, and the aforementioned helmet priced at a whopping $5,000. Allegedly, this same helmet could be purchased on Alibaba for just $29. And it wasn’t just the helmet; everything on the site looked like it could have been ripped from the Chinese marketplace. Plus, there were no signs of new music. Fans were sick.
September 15, 2021
Carti posts an iMessage screenshot on the platform then known as Twitter of a groupchat with members of his camp. A text he sent claims his website was hacked and the merch was never approved. About 12 hours later, he posts a screenshot of another text message that confirms the presence of an album: “FORGET ABOUT SAMPLE CLEARANCES . DROP NARCISSIST.”
Nobody dropped Narcissist.
April 12, 2022
In a rare cover feature for XXL, months after silently abandoning the Narcissist album, Carti reveals the name for his next record as Music, “because that’s all it is at this point.” Interviewer Vanessa Satten mentions how the unreleased music he played for her features a “deeper voice” than any of his previous work, a tidbit fans quickly latched onto. When asked about Music’s lyrical themes, Carti responds, “Love. Sex. Drugs. I’ve been rapping about going to rehab. I want to go to rehab because I think I’m bipolar.”
December 25, 2022
By the second anniversary of Whole Lotta Red, Carti fans were so thirsty for new music, they were making concept announcements for a new album. The day before WLR turned two, the rapper posted a mirror selfie of an androgynous model dressed in all-black. There was no caption. Placed neatly in the bottom right corner of the photo is a Parental Advisory sticker: an indication of new music. That same night, hip-hop insider DJ Akademiks took to Twitter to post “Carti OTW.”