On Repeat: I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside: An Album by Earl Sweatshirt - By Earl Sweatshirt

By Dylan Shulman

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This is the perfect quarantine album, and it’s been on repeat in my mind since coronavirus started. “I ain't been outside in a minute / I been living what I wrote,” Earl says on the hook of the fourth track. For me, this 2015 album is one of Earl’s most focused. From the lyrics to the instrumentals, there is a clear directive to this album. It’s unfortunate that sometimes artists are at their best when their mental state is at its worst. Tracks “Grief,” “Faucet,” and “Wool” shine on this record, with a low point on “DNA,” if only cause I don’t like former Odd Future skater Na’Kel Smith’s feature. An interesting thing is that some of the tracks don’t even have hooks, only a verse or two and that’s it. Nevertheless, poetry doesn’t need repetition.

Earl has primary production credits for most songs, but fellow former Odd Future member Left Brain also did some of the work. The duo uses a lot of low-fi effects in the instrumentals, bit-crushing, compressing and distorting to give an old-school feel. It works well as they also incorporate samples in most of the tracks. Some of my issues with later Earl projects is that his voice gets lost easily in the instrumentals and it’s harder to hear his iconic lyrics, but I don't think that's the case here. Many songs have instrumental outros which add some much-needed time to the songs and display enjoyable production, although not nearly Kanye level. An album with only ten songs, “I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside” makes every bar count as Earl tackles his absent father, the death of his grandmother, and the poisons of money and fame. This is my favorite Earl project, and in times like this when the world just keeps getting darker, sometimes I just don’t want to go outside.

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Rating

9/10