JUICY J

STAY TRIPPY (Taylor Gang/Kemosabe/Columbia)

11/20

Stay Trippy is the third studio album from Juicy J. Juicy J is a founding member of the Three 6 Mafia who is now signed to Wiz Khalifa’s Taylor Gang imprint, and Stay Trippy is a one-hour expedition into the Juicy of 2013: a man whose excessive lifestyle is the framework for his entire creative output. Juicy makes no apologies, shows no signs of stopping and shows a sharp disregard for anyone who questions his conduct.

A day in the life of 38-year-old Juicy J is a peculiar prospect. Stay Trippy is definitely his personal mantra as well as his album title. He has a reputation for partying, but doing so in the most lavish, monied fashion imaginable. Bandz a Make Her Dance is Juicy letting listeners know that women will dance at the strip club if they get money, which is something he has done loads of times. Literally, loads of times. The Woods is a song about having sex in ‘the woods’. Scholarship (perhaps the strangest) is Juicy J offering cash for college funds (he has loads of cash) but you have to do the splits on a boat or something before he gives you the money. If It Ain’t is Juicy saying that he loves weed and most stuff that isn’t weed doesn’t really float his boat at all.

It’s very easy to laugh at this album, and we have, a lot. However, beneath the bravado there’s the shadow of a man who was once part of a menacing Memphis hip-hop outfit and is now so devastatingly committed to staying trippy that his credibility is waning. We can’t help but wonder what Juicy does in his downtime. Does he have down time? Maybe that’s the point. He said once in an interview, “I’m not married and I don’t have any kids. You’re looking at a man with nothing. It’s just me and my cash.” It’s at this point you realise that Juicy J might just break your heart. The centerpiece of that quote is “You’re looking at a man with nothing”. Jesus. It makes Stay Trippy feel like a step in the wrong direction. There are many spritely young things more than capable of making stripper-friendly bangers which would allow Juicy J to take some time off. He could see Asia, he could learn to cook or get a pet or something. It’s okay for Juicy J to slow down.

Devastating as it is compelling, Stay Trippy is far from a triumph. The opening few tracks hark back to some of the frenetic energy that put Three 6 Mafia on the map, but the rest of the album is a shallow exposé of a man who is victim to his own recklessness in the least rock ‘n’ roll way possible.

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Words: Duncan Harrison