Big 14, also known as Trippie Redd, released the anticipated fourth installment to his “A Love Letter to You” series on November 22, 2019. My expectations going into this album were lower because of my disappointment in his last project. However, I admittedly had high expectations from his third and fourth albums “Life’s a Trip” and “A Love Letter to You 3” because of his style of mixing Emo Screams, R&B singing and tongue-in-cheek rhymes that notoriously lack substance (on occasion). After a first listen I can definitely say that it was stronger than the previous album.
The first track is called “Leray,” a sad acoustic story from Redd of why him and his latest girlfriend broke up. The song’s name “Leray” is about his ex-girlfriend and fellow rap contemporary Coi Leray. He basically delivers his feelings on her currently over some light acoustic guitar strumming, saying the best part of them was himself. 4/10
“Who Needs Love” is the second track on this album and it’s a jumpy trap ballad that is a petty look inside what’s going on in Redd’s head. The instrumental and overall sound is similar to his genre peers Juice WRLD and Lil Tecca. This track is where the songwriting gets predictable as ever, talking about toting guns, having exuberant amounts of money and how he has never changed despite his fame. 6/10
Track three is “Love Sick” and after I listened to it repeatedly, sick is what I felt. It was the first track I didn’t save to my Spotify liked songs because it was the first song I’d trim off this album as fat. The track is about Redd’s former high school lover; in the chorus he only wants the highlights of the relationships to be remembered by her, saying, “Shawty, you can just forget about what I said. Think it’s best to live without what I said, ’cause I’m so sick of love songs.” 3/10
“Love Me More” is basically a song about Trippie begging for love from a person who is lacking feelings on her side, highlighting an imbalance within the relationship and addressing how he hates that she seems to be taking his love for granted. In the chorus Redd compares this feeling to let her have his love and either leave or stay, anything but remain how she is currently, not committing. 6.5/10
The fifth track on this album is called “Real Fee.” Out of his more low key songs, where he is singing more than rapping, it’s a personal favorite. Redd carries this tune by singing about what he normally does, wanting someone’s love and shooting his haters, claiming in the chorus that he doesn’t give a “f***” what they feel when talking about him and this girl’s love.This song would be perfect if Redd just left out his second verse because the song feels like it overstays its welcome since he switches his topic. 7/10
Certain artists scare me when I see them in track listings. One of the artists who make me feel this way is Lil Mosey because of his freestyles and music. Admittedly, I wasn’t excited for track 6, also known as “This Ain’t That,” which features Lil Mosey. I was pleasantly surprised by this song, though, because of its sticky chorus and Redd’s tongue-in-cheek verse that perfectly suits his style of singing. Mosey’s portion of the song contained an okay verse that’s slurred, and any other rapper could have filled and done something more interesting with it. 6/10
“6 Kiss” was a track I was heavily interested in after looking at the tracklist because it features YNW Melly & Juice WRLD, two standout artists within the past year. Juice WRLD starts by delivering a run-of-the-mill, angsty, drug-fueled verse that flows right into YNW Melly’s segment. Melly surprisingly holds his own with his bigger contemporaries in the song, his verse coming off like it’s a freestyle. Redd delivers a verse that starts out great until it’s halted when he makes an unnecessary piss joke. This song’s biggest issue is that even though the verses are alright nobody shines bright. 5/10
“Til The End of Time” starts off with the voice of a girl responding to someone (presumably Redd). She talks about listening to him in the car and then getting out and seeing a message from him. Redd then croons for the rest of the song, saying he wants to be with this girl “til the end of time.” Since this is a softer cut on the album it doesn’t hold a lot of replay value. 5/10
The halfway point on this album is the track “U Deserve It” featuring Quan’ta and Chris King over another run-of-the-mill acoustic guitar trap instrumental, co-produced by Seph Got The Waves and Starboy. Redd is catchy on the chorus, but it can get old quickly because of his repetition of the phrase “shawty right there” continuously. When hearing this, Redd comes off as if he’s a feature on his own track. However, Chris King and Quan’ta both have great standout verses that carry the song bar after bar. 7/10
“Hate Me” is a spacey callout for somebody’s love which Redd is no stranger to. However, my eyebrows were raised when I saw this track was featuring YoungBoy Never Broke Again; I was equally as taken back when listening, as he was carrying the complete other half of the song. Redd and YoungBoy share the pre-chorus and chorus together, but they both get rough once they reach their upper registers.In the middle of the song YoungBoy uses an impressive, different flow, where he places the emphasis on each of the words he’s saying, like a metronome was playing two quarter notes for each of the eight lines of his verse. 4/10
DISCLAIMER: This is the sole opinion of the Joseph Guzman.
