Wednesday 5/12: YTK—"Let It Off"
Today, we share our thoughts on a new viral song from Baltimore rapper YTK.
Welcome to Endless Scroll, the brainchild of Eli Enis (he/him), Eric Bennett (they/them), Michael Brooks (he/him) and Miranda Reinert (she/her). Since Feb. 2019, we’ve been a weekly podcast about music, the internet, and where those two things intersect. On Substack, we’re also a M-F newsletter about songs. Our format is simple: a link to a song and a short take from each of us about what we think of it. Each day of the week has a corresponding genre: Monday is indie, Tuesday is punk, Wednesday is hip-hop, Thursday is pop, and Friday is misc. Three days of the week are free but you can get access to all five weekly posts by subscribing for $5/month via Substack or $2/month via our Patreon.
Today, we share our thoughts on a new viral song from Baltimore rapper YTK.
YTK—"Let It Off"
Michael Brooks:
Last Friday, a friend sent me a tweet featuring a clip from the “Let It Off” music video and I knew from the jump that I would be listening to it all weekend. The viral hit from Baltimore rapper YTK transforms Mariah Carey’s 2005 hit “Shake It Off” into something more sinister, and there’s something that’s so intoxicating about listening to him threaten to turn somebody into lo mein over that sugary melody. YTK is far from the first rapper to flip a 2000s pop hit into something completely different, but he does a damn good job at it. The song is so gleeful and outlandish that I can’t imagine how somebody could watch the video and not smile the whole time.
The video in particular reminds me a lot of “Rascal” by RMR, which was a viral hit a little over a year ago, and the numerous shots of people in ski masks toting humongous guns over an R&B jam from my childhood is a dizzying contrast, probably the reason I keep coming back to it. I know that this song is a complete 180 from the majority of YTK’s other stuff which can be a bit of a double-edged sword for an artist on the come up but I’m just happy that it exists. Consider it the first real contender for my official song of the summer, or at the very least a song I will make people listen to A LOT this summer whenever the CDC says it’s safe to party again.
Eli Enis:
This is definitely fun and I’d say a helluva lot less gimmicky than RMR ended up being, though I do remember how cool that video felt for a couple days last spring. “Let It Off” obviously owes so much to the Mariah Carey sample it’s flipping, but in that sense, YTK’s additions and goofy video presence almost feel like him honoring one of the greats in a remix-y type fashion. Like Michael said, it seems designed to become a song of the summer once people can congregate again and nostalgia begins to wash all over us, so why not have a track like this that merges the rap developments of the last couple years with something millennials remember hearing in our parent’s cars when we were young? It’s nice stuff.