‘Call Me If You Get Lost’: Searching and Succeeding

[peekaboo]

Tyler, the Creator celebrates and confronts his past on an album that hearkens back to the mixtape rap of the early 2000s.

Tyler, the Creator performing on Sunday

Photo: mario anzuoni/Reuters

Early on, media-savvy rapper, producer and mogul Tyler, the Creator (born Tyler Okonma and raised in Los Angeles County), like so many musical artists before him, knew that controversy was a great way to get attention when no one knows who you are. Between 2007 and 2010, his mostly teenage collective Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All, which included eventual stars like rapper Earl Sweatshirt and singer Frank Ocean, issued a string of influential homemade mixtapes. Much of the music coming from the camp featured shocking lyrics filled with homophobia, misogyny and violent imagery—the grisly B-movie stories of hip-hop’s horrorcore subgenre were a point of comparison—only some of which seemed played for laughs. Tyler’s full-length debut LP, 2011’s “Goblin,” picked up where the early work left off in terms of its grim subject matter. 

Had he stuck with the shock tactics—Eminem was a major influence—Tyler, now 30 years old, probably would have remained a cult artist. But with each new release he has let more of his personality show, and his musical talent developed in parallel. His 2017 record, “Flower Boy,” was newly vulnerable and easily his best work to that point, and with 2019’s “Igor” he snagged both a Grammy and had his first No. 1 LP on the Billboard 200. 

“Igor” was a breakthrough and Tyler must have spent some time thinking about how to follow it. With his sixth album, “Call Me if You Get Lost” (Columbia), out now, he’s lowered the stakes slightly while further refining his craft. In one sense, the record is a loving tribute to the rap mixtapes of the early 2000s, when stars like Lil Wayne and 50 Cent would put out unofficial releases on CD or online. Atlanta-based DJ Drama (Tyree Simmons) was a cornerstone of this scene, and Tyler enlists him to serve as this album’s master of ceremonies. Drama’s ad-libs, running commentary and hype-man encouragement serve as a framing device on a record that celebrates Tyler’s success with warmth and humor. 

Photo: COLUMBIA RECORDS

The first track, “Sir Baudelaire, ” finds Tyler borrowing the French poet’s name for the semi-autobiographical character at the center of the album’s narrative. He’s a wealthy aesthete who searches for love and looks past those who would dismiss him. “Swim trunks in the trunk, Geneva water the best,” Tyler raps in the first of several references to that Swiss city, a symbol of luxury. The song’s de-tuned guitar imparts a warm, woozy atmosphere, and it feels both humid and sun-bleached.

On the advance single “Lumberjack” a few tracks later, Drama’s background shouts create a feeling of communal celebration. Here Tyler’s rapping is low key and mush-mouthed, bringing to mind underground legend MF Doom, who died late in 2020. “Salad-colored emerald on finger, the size of croutons” is among the song’s memorable images. Along with “Rise!” and “Juggernaut,” it’s one of a few party-starting cuts on the record, and all are elevated by Tyler’s consummate skill in the producer’s chair. 

Sonically, “Call Me” is dense and busy, filled with jazzy samples, thick synths and syncopated drums. A lot of the album feels as if it’s being overheard in the street, in a good way. It sounds like a group of people having a good time somewhere just out of sight. And the beats also evoke the idea of travel, touching on an array of genres (R&B, jazz, reggae, rock) as we hear about Tyler’s exotic adventures in far-flung locales, usually while a Rolls-Royce ferries him from one location to another.

Tyler, the Creator

Photo: Matt Sayles/Associated Press

Woven through the celebratory materialism are observations about what Tyler has struggled against and what it means to achieve in a world that doesn’t seem to want you to. On “Massa,” a complicated track about the artist’s own past and also his challenges as a Black musician, he feels underappreciated (“I paint full pictures of my perspective on these drum breaks / Just for you to tell me, ‘It’s not good,’ from your lunch break”) yet proud of what he’s done for his family. While on “Manifesto,” he brags about not shying away from his controversial reputation (“I was canceled before canceled was with Twitter fingers / Protestin’ outside my shows, I gave them the middle finger”). His more serious raps are never didactic; he never claims to have all the answers, and he has an infectious curiosity to go with his deep self-belief. 

While traveling the world and spending freely seem to come easy on these songs, lasting relationships are trickier. Tyler is confident when bragging about owning expensive guitars and lots of houses, but intimacy is still a mystery. Two tracks of epic length, “Sweet / I Thought You Wanted to Dance” and “Wilshire,” are about promising but ultimately doomed romances. Each is laced with humor and funny asides (“Felt like dirty dishes ’cause we was in sync”) but they’re bracingly honest about material objects being no substitute for love. 

The album’s titular line appears repeatedly throughout the record, sometimes voiced by Tyler and sometimes by DJ Drama. It suggests a desire to be there for someone, and also suggests that the rapper has found where he’s supposed to be. But here, on this third excellent full-length album in a row, it’s clear that he owes his success to the fact that he never stops searching.