As much as I enjoy it now, for a while I had a difficult and complicated relationship with trap music. I barely even got into hip-hop as a whole until 2017, and even then it took me years to appreciate the different facets of the genre the way I do at this point. Up until that point, I would hear a trap song while eating lunch or from my college suitemate’s speaker and just cringe. I didn’t understand the purpose of trap back then, and the sound definitely did not resonate with me. Thankfully I have evolved beyond the point of calling any trap music I don’t like “mumble rap” or saying that “new rap sucks”.
With all of that said, some music just doesn’t hit me the way I want it to no matter how hard I try or how much my taste changes. This is the case with today’s subject, Cardi B’s Invasion Of Privacy. I am aware Cardi has not dropped an album in several years, and the mainstream music sphere has long transitioned out of her style of music being the most popular. The thing is Invasion Of Privacy not only won the best rap album Grammy against four acclaimed and seminal albums, but is also looked upon somewhat fondly even today by music critics and fans alike. Personally, I just don’t get it. Invasion Of Privacy is an album that, more often than not, takes any potential it has and wastes it on terrible beats that border on parody, weak features that almost all make the song they are on actively worse, and a generally annoying presence from Cardi herself.
Funnily enough, the album doesn’t start off as a trainwreck, as the opener is actually decent. Get Up 10 has a lot of what the rest of the album lacks. It has heart, an enjoyable beat, and varied flows. Get Up 10 features a piano beat that starts off airy and atmospheric and slowly turns into a poppy trap banger. Cardi starts off detailing her upbringing and it is, in fact, compelling. She talks about going from “rags to riches” and choosing being a rapper over a dancer, but then when the beat ramps up it just turns into flexing and acting tough. “If it’s all love, show me love then” and similar bars are basically just white noise on the song. With that said, the beat is still cool, with some crazy hi hats and other trap drums, plus an acceleration of the piano section. This makes Cardi’s less than stellar continuation of her verse worth listening to anyway.
The album’s real issues begin with the following track, Drip. The beat is extremely static and lifeless. It has these whistle-like synths and some trap drums, and that’s about ninety percent of it. It’s flaccid and basically doesn’t pick up throughout the entire song. It’s one of many beats on this album that borders on parody. This is a beat one might hear on a show like Saturday Night Live, when they are parodying trap in a sketch. It is overly minimalist and only provides enjoyment for about the first twenty seconds of it. It meshes well with the repetitive chorus I suppose, which just has Cardi and the featured Migos saying “drip drip” over and over again. The verses are also mixed so loud that they don’t do the production any favors. It genuinely sounds like an a cappella track at times. Cardi’s verse also starts the trend on the album of her being annoyingly breathy in her verses. The worst part is she isn’t saying anything of substance or anything fun. She’s not spouting absurd nonsense like Lil Pump or 21 Savage. She’s literally just coasting, and Migos do the exact same thing as well. There is nothing to latch onto here or even vibe to. Not a single good line.
One of the more popular singles on this album, Bodak Yellow, has a somewhat more energetic beat but the repetitive nature of it still exudes that parody feel that Drip had. It doesn’t help that Cardi delivers a slow, nursery rhyme flow almost the whole time that also appears on other tracks in different ways. The main issue with this flow is that she overemphasizes certain words in a way that does not benefit the song given the annoying, breathy cadence she uses to do so. It is, for lack of a better word, goofy. Perhaps it’s meant to be that way, with Shakespearean lines such as “I don’t bother with these hoes, I don’t let these hoes bother me”. She is really just riffing on this song for a single.
The song Best Life has a verse from Cardi that retreads some of the ground from Get Up 10, further detailing her upbringing, but in a less compelling manner this time. After that we get a chorus and verse from none other than Chance The Rapper. When I saw Chance on the feature list I was wondering if we would be getting the cool, Acid Rap Chance or the lame “The Big Day” Chance. It took one “ack!” from him to make me realize it was the latter. Chance truly shows he was already starting to lose his artistic integrity with this song. He sings about making “a couple of m’s” with his “best friends” in the hook. He also sings this annoying “skrrrrt” sound in the chorus. Vocally it almost sounds like X Ambassadors with the faux grandeur in the vocal layering. In the verse itself he emphasizes the last word of every line in a way that, along with the generally limp or cheesy delivery throughout, just makes this verse annoying and fairly worthless. The song doesn’t pick up from there either. There’s a weak Cardi verse like the one from earlier, though it isn’t really worth discussing despite the flow being slightly better than the last few tracks.
I was begging for Chance to come back once the next track started. I Like It is arguably the most grating song on the album, and it was also the biggest single. It has a somewhat Latin flare to it with its horns which is about the only interesting part of the song. Cardi is, unfortunately, entirely grating on the song. Cardi talks about the lavish things she likes, then makes it very clear to the listener she is definitely Cardi B. “They call me Cardi” is a line said multiple times outside the hook, and yes that is indeed her stage name. Not much of note happens on the verse besides the cadences being particularly grating here. She is yelling at the listener and it doesn’t generate nearly the hype one would want from a song like this, given how annoying she is on here. The nursery rhyme criticism also applies here. It sounds like she’s rapping to a five year old, especially in the hook. We also get a frustratingly generic verse from Bad Bunny. Not a surprise coming from Bad Bunny, but it doesn’t do the song any favors.
Another track in the second half with a fairly annoying feature is Bartier Cardi. I have never been a huge 21 Savage fan but he really gets dragged into doing the same unpleasant flow that Cardi employs on the track (that flow being the one where Cardi overemphasizes the last word of each line). It doesn’t help that her rhyme scheme overuses the “ar” sound, nor does the genericism of the rest of the flow. It is derivative, annoying, and of course 21 bites off of it at the beginning of his verse. 21 has admittedly gotten better over the years but he was not there yet at this point in time. After he copies Cardi’s flow for a bit, he just adds a few extra syllables. The fun part is he has the opposite problem Cardi has where he barely emphasizes anything. I suppose it’s a nice change of pace, but it’s still pretty annoying at the end of the day. The beat is also fairly nothing and borders on parody like much of the rest of the production.
I would expect an album with the bombast of Invasion Of Privacy to end with a bang. Instead of showing Cardi’s skill, charm and passion, we get a cut that says almost nothing and is about thirty percent the SZA hook. The decision to end the album with this track is confusing to say the least, as it’s one of the most uninteresting tracks on the entire album. SZA basically steals the show here, being the only passable feature on the album. Even with that being said, she isn’t saying anything that’s catchy or interesting. She says she has expensive taste essentially, which does nothing for me. Cardi hypes herself up in the most derivative way possible. She talks about “bad bitches” and her genitalia. Honestly, it might be more fun if the beat were a bit better. Cardi’s cadence isn’t even that bad here, but the track is just boring overall. I’m surprised such a big album ends on such a whimper, but I guess I shouldn’t be by now.
I have warmed up to trap music over the years. At its best, it can be fun, vibey, and interesting all at once. The genre has had an interesting history and an arguably even more fascinating rise to popularity. With that said, I do not believe Invasion Of Privacy by Cardi B is the best the genre has to offer. Far from it, in fact. This is an album that seems to be more for Cardi’s brand than the music itself. From the features that range from half baked to irritating, to the repetitive flows, rhyme schemes, and verses, to the fact that it just doesn’t do anything that trap wasn’t already doing in some capacity before it. I do not believe Invasion Of Privacy is much more than Cardi getting her name out there on a vehicle for her singles. The biggest point I can give this album is that Cardi has a lot of energy, even on the most limp beats. The issue is that she uses this energy in dull or annoying ways most of the time. I truly hope that if Cardi does release a follow up to this album soon, she learns from her contemporaries who have made much better strides in trap music. I hope she uses her high energy and star power for something interesting in the future, because it really didn’t happen here.
3/10
