Vince Staples always has plenty to say, and he isn’t shy. Having taken on the entireworld and become something of an internet talking head, he’s now ready to figure out where, exactly, he fits into rap, and how rap fits into society at large. His sophomore album, Big Fish Theory, peers into the fishbowl of the fragile rap ecosystem and considers how “rappers are perceived and perceive themselves,” as he puts it. The result is a sleek rave-rap record that casually probes celebrity and class, a release that is half celebration of rap stardom and half critique of the often toxic culture it breeds. Staples is as clever as ever, but now the beats travel faster than his racing mind.
The driving force behind Big Fish Theory is tempo; Staples exudes manic energy, departing from the unnerving calm that marked earlier releases. In the run-up to the album, he referred to the project as futuristic, and even labeled it Afrofuturism for a while, though he later claimed he was trolling. But the record is truly progressive and unconventional—“When the Vince Staples is playing, it’s 2029, bro,” he said on Beats 1. “Vince Staples is coming once again with the brand new sound.” While the sound in question is mostly retrofitted dance music that slopes to suit rap cadences, there’s something radical in how swiftly and easily he scales these craggy bops with fractured verses. And there’s a certain boldness and adventurousness to following your weirdest project with your cheekiest one.
Summertime ‘06 was frequently grayscale and amelodic, an elaborate configuration of whale horns, discordant strings, and clanging, metallic rhythms. Big Fish Theory leans toward electronic club music (house and Detroit techno, especially), assembling an unlikely cabal of beatmakers including chief collaborator Zack Sekoff (a regular on the L.A. Beat scene), SOPHIE, Jimmy Edgar, GTA, and Flume, among others. The new album is smooth where Summertime ‘06 was jagged, foregoing the disquieting noise for something more functional, finding sophistication in streamlined motion, like an art installation set up in a nightclub. Even though the two albums are stylistically different and have conflicting agendas, Big Fish Theory feels like a natural progression. Amid the gleaming productions, he’s still exploring darkness.
Staples’ 2016 EP, Prima Donna, opened with a budding rap star dying by suicide before tracing the path that led him there, and Big Fish Theory further explores the theme. Amy Winehouse speaks in the opening seconds of “Alyssa Interlude” (via an excerpt from a 2006 interview), setting the tone: “I’m quite a self-destructive person, so I guess I keep giving myself material,” she concludes, a sobering look into her process. Winehouse has long been a source of inspiration for Staples (the documentary Amy was the initial spark for Prima Donna), and he has openly criticized the public’s treatment of the late singer. The symbiotic relationship and resulting tension between a tortured artist and their audience weighs heavy on Vince’s mind (See: the “Señorita” video or the Prima Donna short film). These weighty questions seep into Big Fish Theory, where he sneaks in outcries like “Propaganda, press pan the camera/Please don’t look at me in my face/Everybody might see my pain/Off the rail, might off myself.” Suicide comes up elsewhere on the record. There are references to Basquiat and he calls himself the new River Phoenix. Amid the partying and paper-chasing, there are flashes of darkness and melancholy: “How am I supposed to have a good time when death and destruction is all I see?”
There’s a chorus of other voices swirling around Staples on Big Fish Theory, but they mostly serve the larger sonic mosaic, echoing and amplifying Staples’ perspective. Guests generally appear in the margins, prove their usefulness, then vanish quickly—Damon Albarn sings for a few seconds, there are some hypeman-style vocals from A$AP Rocky, some garnishing R&B harmonies courtesy of Ray J, Kučka provides a quick interlude, Juicy J drops swag chants. They each play their roles well or at worst become part of the backdrop, aiding the general flow and texture of the album. But frequent collaborator Kilo Kish serves sort of secret weapon: her ability to move wispily through a song without disruption is key to several moments on the record, as on the entry on “Love Can Be…,” the softly, sweetly-sung coda on “Homage,” and the evaporating murmurs that lead “Crabs in a Bucket” into “Big Fish.” The biggest drop-in is Kendrick Lamar’s turn on the flossy “Yeah Right,” which delivers pyrotechnics as he and Vince dismantle tropes on rap’s inherent boastfulness.
Songs on Big Fish Theory don’t operate the way we’re accustomed to Vince Staples songs operating. Staples has long traded on incisive and detail-oriented reporting, centering his observations and occupying all space in the mind’s eye. He is known for writing heavy, plainspoken confessions packed with detail. Here, the songs run on high-powered verses that tumble and split to accommodate the current, and his rapping is noticeably fleeter and more efficient. For other rappers, adjusting to the new mode might be awkward, but Staples’ lyrical precision allows him to cover just as much ground in fewer steps. The economy of his language makes for pithy dialogue (On “745”: “Eyes can’t hide your hate for me/Maybe you was made for the Maybelline/Spent so much tryna park the car/Barely got a tip for the maître d’”) and sharp, first-glance impressions of those in his orbit, adding bite-sized nuggets like “paid a pretty penny for my peace of mind.” Each passing stanza is a marvel of concision.
Across 36 minutes, Vince Staples crams slinky disclosures on class and entitlement into infectious and eccentric club bangers. He leaves us with thoughts on fame’s corrupting influence and love’s power, all from a rising rap star who understands his reach and the limits of his celebrity. Big Fish Theory is a compact rap gem for dancing to or simply sitting with, an album that is as innovative as it is accessible; if not a glimpse into the future, then it’s at least an incisive look at the present. “This is Afrofuturism y’all can keep the other shit. We’re trying to get in the MoMA not your Camry,” Vince wrote, half-joking, in a since-deleted tweet. The funny thing is, Big Fish Theory might just be equipped for both.
