In 2015, Jacques Webster, better known as Travis Scott, made a statement that’s been evident in every one of his performances since: “This stage is sacred.” He goes on to say that it’s when he’s at peace, before proclaiming that he’d give his kidney up for any of his 2000 fans that come to see his shows (a number which has only increased in his meteoric rise since). There are literally compilation videos chronicling the chaos and madness that surround Travis’s concerts, where mosh pits are the norm and when injury might be more likely than not. Not to mention, he’s the only artist I’ve known to make a Jimmy Kimmel crowd go crazy (with an absolutely mind-blowing visual set design as well).
All of this makes it hard to believe that Travis Scott was once an underdog; once a polarizing figure in the trap rap scene, but now unquestionably one of the biggest superstars in popular music today. There was literally a Fortnite festival revolving around Travis Scott. When he released Rodeo in 2015, his first debut studio album, the reception was lukewarm–there were complaints of Travis biting off of his influences (Kanye, his mentor, was often mentioned as one of the bitees, along with Future and T.I.), of Travis not having an interesting story, not being an alluring-enough MC. In the years since, Travis has rapidly ascended to superstardom, with 2018’s ASTROWORLD debuting at number one on the charts (have you heard of “Sicko Mode”? Underrated track.). But I think Travis peaked with Rodeo, an album that stretches the limit of trap rap to aspirational levels. It’s woozy, atmospheric, sparkling, grandiose, cinematic, striking, and above all else, engaging.
Listen: Travis Scott – Rodeo
The album opens with one of trap rap’s pioneers, T.I., giving a spoken word intro, one that is all too fitting for the journey we’re about to embark on:
“Nine light years away, just outside the Keplar solar system
We find ourselves consumed and utterly mesmerized
With a story of a young rebel against the system
Refusing to conform or comply to the ways of authority
He chose the mood of ‘fuck this shit’”
It’s an odd choice to open up your debut studio album with (an album that has immense hype surrounding it), and might seem to give off a pretense of this being a concept album with a unifying theme or message. So maybe that’s why critics were confused when the album’s 14 tracks didn’t really tell a coherent story. Instead, the songs on Rodeo immersed us in an atmosphere, a lifestyle, and a generational mindset. Typical trap rap songs are characterized by lots of hi-hats, an extensive use of synths, and a general melancholic feeling. But most of them don’t evolve like the songs on Rodeo do, nor do they have the rich texture that so many do have on this album.
Following T.I.’s monologue, “Pornography” kicks off with grungy guitars and booming, dark synths with a menacing bassline growling underneath. Travis comes in, rap-singing about a hedonistic lifestyle: “No monogamy, menage with me/Pornography, surrounding me/You get high with me, you come down with me/Yeah, that’s all I need, in my fantasy”. Grand, bright pianos come in while T.I. gives another interlude, speaking of this rebel, wondering if he will survive this rodeo, and then after an inspired verse, Travis Scott gives his Rodeo thesis statement: “we gon’ rule the world”. It’s hard not to believe him.
Songs on Rodeo are quite long for the genre, with many in the high 5-minute ranges and some even stretching to 8. The tracks go through mood shifts, beat changes, and ultimately, they never stop progressing. The momentum is palpable in these songs, and the second track, “Oh My Dis Side” is a perfect example of this. The first two and a half minutes, the “Oh My” portion, is a brooding banger with hard kick drums and distorted guitars wailing off in the distance, and Quavo ad-libs doing what they do best (“Cash!”, “Momma!”, “Money!” to name a few). It’s talking about the come-up, the hard work that Travis has put in to “get [his] momma that new house now” so “now she cannot kick [him] out” (parental doubts are a consistent theme throughout this album, perhaps the most personal Travis gets throughout the project).
And then the song changes into “Dis Side”, with sparkling keys and auto-tuned crooning “ooh”s backed by soaring synths. Travis raps about missing his hometown, and the song has an unquestionably nostalgic feeling to it. Quavo comes in with a verse, with a beautiful piano backing his ad-libs (“PHENOMENAL!”). The outro of the song almost sounds like a nursery rhyme with the soft piano, despite the lyrics: “You know how I like my lean poured/Just right, on this side”.
From there, the album goes to “3500”, a nearly 8-minute trap rap odyssey featuring Future and 2 Chainz. This song is a deep dive into the hedonism that drives much of trap, a look at the pure wealth and excess that many rappers love to talk about. But the difference with Travis Scott is the feeling of unease that runs like an undercurrent through so many of these tracks. For every melodic chord (and there are a lot of them sprinkled throughout the album) there’s a distorted bassline; for every seemingly angelic backup vocal there’s a dark synth surrounding it.
It’s this perfect balance that Travis strikes for much of this album; on the surface lyrically, it’s a typical trap rap album talking about that lifestyle of success and pleasure seeking. But take a deeper listen to the music and a more complex image comes into focus. It feels like Travis is unsure about this lifestyle that he’s been plunged into, but since he’s here, he’s going to enjoy it and live it on his terms. “3500” ends with a gorgeous twinkling piano, with string-like synths supporting it and bouncy, rubbery drums fading out, as the beat slows down and stretches out.
My personal favorite song on this album (and also Travis’s) “90210” is another song that completely changes course halfway through its runtime. It opens with heavenly backing vocals from Kacy Hill with Travis talking about his transformation, “Jacques becoming Scott”, and quintessential Mike Dean guitars blazing in and out. He’s talking about himself in the third person here, processing his rise to success–it’s a slow burn of an intro, almost as if he’s describing his life before he touches down in LA, that essential place so many artists go to after fame and accomplishments.
Half way through, the song almost abruptly changes, with a glitzy guitar solo, a chopped up piano chord progression, hand claps, and Travis Scott giving his best Kid Cudi-like hums before he launches into a first-person retrospective on his newfound success. The pace of the song picks up significantly, as if to describe his new lifestyle, here in LA where “friends [turned] into fraud n****s”. He brings up his parents, who had initially heavily frowned upon Travis’s music and dreams, kicking him out of their house:
“What happened? Now my daddy happy
Mama called me up, that money coming and she love me
I done made it now, I done found life’s meaning now
All them days her heart’d break, her heart not in pieces now”
He name-drops his mentor, Kanye, and describes the relationship there with the line: “I passed the rock to Ye, he pump faked then passed it back, bitch”. He talks about his chains, rings, designer clothes. The song is careening at a blistering pace now, as if Travis is cruising down Hollywood with the top down, marveling at his newfound success but never forgetting where he came from. It’s a truly thrilling track, bursting at the seams with confidence and it excels in its execution.
I could go on and on about so many songs on here. My night-time-drive theme song of choice, “Nightcrawler” with its dark and brooding basslines contrasted with bright and soaring synths. The surprising anthem, “Antidote”, with its woozy and hazy atmosphere, as if you’re walking through a smoke-filled house party, high off some cocktail of drugs and alcohol (“don’t you open up that winDOW!”). The six-minute sultry ode to alcohol and partying “Maria I’m Drunk”, which features Justin Bieber at his near best (“Girl, I want you on the rocks, no chaser”) and a classic Young Thug flying all over the track. The unlikely collaboration with indie crooner Toro y Moi on “Flying High”, a track which makes you literally feel like you’re flying high (“In the meantime I’ll watch colors in the sky/And I’ll watch you go by”). All of these tracks move you through the album in unexpecting and thrilling ways, with twists and turns coming nonstop, each of the beats showing you how propulsive and innovative trap rap can be. It makes Rodeo a project with amazing replay value, with each song having intricate details and stylistic switch-ups that make them sound fresh and unique with each listen.
But even with all of these guest features, with all of the collaboration that took place on the project, presiding at the center of it all is Travis Scott. He doesn’t delve into his personal life all that much on the album (with a few exceptions), or talk about his current struggles or vices. He instead decides to treat the listener to a sonic collage of his lifestyle, his rise to fame, and his artistry. “Every beat on this album was made from scratch. Not one beat was sent in. Not one. I was involved with every beat,” Travis explained in an interview around the release of the album. Upon realizing that, it’s hard not to marvel at the instrumentation, the choices that Travis makes on each song, the atmosphere that he wholly chose to create and immerse the listener in.
The album closes with “Apple Pie”, a bright, uplifting song with bouncy piano chords and Travis sounding like he’s completing a victory lap. Much of it is directed to his mom (“I don’t want your apple pie, mama”), and it’s apparent that Travis’s parents have made an impact on his mindset (he brought them up both in the aforementioned “90210” and the penultimate track, “I Can Tell”). In a 2012 interview that spans many topics, fighting with his parents is one that sticks out:
“My dad used to come in my room like, ‘Turn that sh*t off!’ Ripping my power out, just making beats die off—it was so many beats I had. I was so cold with my dad. It got to a point he was shutting off power in my room! […] Like your parents are supposed to be 100%, backbone support, it’s f*cking like, ‘F*ck that!’”
The underdog, rebellious mentality that T.I. alludes to in the opening track has a backstory; his support system failed him from a young age, he got kicked out, he moved around the country in the pursuit of his dreams, but he had a vision and he executed on it. In the same interview, he states: “My music is very diverse, I don’t want it to ever be typecasted.” Rodeo is a masterclass in that; it’s the peak of the genre, in my opinion, a peak that pushes boundaries and constantly shifts and surprises with each track. “I am everything except a rapper,” Travis raps on the last song, making his intention clear: he’s an artist, and you were just treated to his kaleidoscopic, colorful painting. We gon’ rule the world, indeed, Travis.