Lil 6 (album)
| Lil 6 | ||||
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 26 January, 2018 | |||
| Recorded |
2015–3 May, 2017 (vocals) · September–December 2017 (mixing, production, guest vocals) | |||
| Genre | Trap | |||
| Length | 57:25 | |||
| Label | O.P. Entertainment · Mirage Music Group | |||
| Producer | Iron Keys (exec.) · Quitmydayjob · Streetside · Trevon Rage · LDX Rage · 2hotZero · Jonji · HerbO · Jimmy 6ix · Berlin on da track · Gun Gary · DCC · 17Idol · BigStacksBP · Kidnsec · Third Nephew · Formeh · SK99 | |||
| Lil 6 chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Lil 6 | ||||
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Lil 6 is the self-titled second studio album by Astorian rapper Lil 6. It was released posthumously by O.P. Entertainment and Mirage Music on 26 January, 2018. The album features appearances by Pluto, Adan, Blastoff, Kaison Dub, Jaynine, Trevon Rage, among others, while it's production was executively handled by frequent collaborator Iron Keys and the Southwest Corridor production collective Head Bangers.
Upon release, the album debuted at number four on the Astorian Sunset 100 with 49,000 album-equivalent units, while peaking in the top-twenty across various international markets.
Background
After garnering national popularity with 2015 mixtapes POV and Lifestyle, the latter being the rapper's first charting release, Lil 6 would sign a recording contract with O.P. Entertainment and Seattle-native label Mirage Music Group for three albums worth $1.2 million. He would join alongside Pluto on Trevon Rage's Far From Andromeda tour (2015–16) across North America and continental Europe.
Opium, the rapper's debut album, would be released on 20 October, 2016, debuting at number 31 in his native Astoria and shipping 26,000 album-equivalent units. From 27 October, 2016, to 11 March, 2017, Lil 6 would embark on his first headlining tour in promotion. Following the tour's conclusion, on 21 April, 2017, the deluxe edition to Opium would be released. On 19 May, 2017, he would die from an accidental drug overdose at his home at the age of 20. His funeral took place at Rose City Cemetery in his hometown of Portland on 26 May, with funeral attendants including collaborators and fellow rappers Pluto, Lil Tec and Greyy Mein.
After his death, Lil 6's fanbase and popularity grew quickly, resulting in a significant increase in sales and streams of his music. Various rappers, including Jaynine, Adan, and Q-Lo would offer their condolences. At the time of his passing, Lil 6 had finished recording his material for a planned collaborative project with Pluto, though his management would deny a surplus of salvageable vocals but maintained "the contractual ability for [his] estate to release music posthumously". Pluto would later record vocals for three of the songs intended, as well as additional vocals for the Jaynine-assisted collaboration "Doing Damage", and would network with O.P. Entertainment in garnering additional guest features. Nearly eight months following the rapper's passing, final recordings and demos would be nominally deconstructed and remixed from their original state with new vocals from various North American rappers being garnered, though songs that were completed mixes would be unchanged, such as "Not Much Left", "IDC", "Perfect", "Used To Be Down" and "My Enemy". Certain songs are entirely new productions, with the demos being divided or sometimes combined into two new or a longer track, such as "In A Minute" and "Doing Damage" both originating from original song "Mad", "Way" featuring an unreleased verse from the previously-released "On The Road", or "No Rush (Outro)" being a splice of two unreleased songs, "Fuck Wit Me".
Singles
The lead single, "IDC", was released on 20 October, 2017, a day short of a year following the release of the rapper's debut album, Opium. Recorded during the same session as "They Know Who I Am", the song would be debut at number 55 on the Astorian Hot 100 singles and number three on the Sierran Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles.
On 17 November, 2017, the album's second single, "Not Much Left", featuring Antillean rapper Pluto, was released aside an official music video featuring archive live footage from Lil 6 while newly recorded footage of Pluto performing his vocals while on tour would be spliced together. The video would garner more than 40 million views by 2023. On 19 January, 2018, "Like Me" featuring Continental R&B singer Adan was released as the album's third single, while the track listing and release date would be revealed. The song would peak at number 49 on the Astorian Hot 100.
On 1 June, 2018, more than a year following the rapper's passing, the fourth single "My Enemy" would be issued to contemporary R&B and hip hop radios. A music video, recorded two weeks prior to his death on 5 May, 2017 and originally meant to be a lead single for the rapper's original second album, would be released to coincide with the single's issuing. The song would be notable for it's more upbeat production and "colorful" lyrics ("We be living so large, all they do is hate but I'm flying to Mars"), while in the video the rapper joyously flexes stacks of hundreds while riding out the rooftop of a Ferraro, with it being revealed by his management that they had been making moves towards Lil 6 entering rehabilitation prior to his untimely death due to the rapper drinking a mixed concoction of Baron Berry and codeine-promethazine throughout the video's production. The video would accumulate more than 20 million views by 2023.
Release
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Aggregate scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Metacritic | 55/100 |
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| WhatMyMusic? |  
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| The Huntington Beach Post |
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| Newstar |
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| Sierra Media | 5.4/10 |
| Music Box Magazine | 4.2/10 |
Commercial performance
The album debuted at number four on the Astorian Sunset 100 with 49,000 album-equivalent units, of which 9,000 were pure album sales in its first week. This became Lil 6's first top-five debut on the chart in his native Astoria, and his second to peak within the top-twenty, following the deluxe edition of Opium. The album also accumulated a total of 58.8 million on-demand streams from the album's songs that week. The album reached the top-twenty in numerous other countries, namely Sierra, Skandinavia and Poland. The album was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on 10 December, 2021.
Critical reception
At Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 55, based on 7 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".
Aftermath
With Lil 6's self-titled album, the proliferation of posthumous albums has become a notable phenomenon in recent years, particularly within the wider hip-hop community, as the album marked a significant shift in how record labels, estates, and fans interact with an artist's legacy after death, due in part to the last posthumous hip hop album having released more than ten years prior, being King Rakeem's Still Thuggin, Vol. 2 (2006).
Due to the charting success from the record, record labels bolstering an artist's popularity despite the individual meeting untimely deaths has led to a wave of posthumous releases by artists such as Q-Lo, Xnyx, Kaison Dub, Lil Coast and Blaxkface Killer. Critics often raise concerns about the ethics of releasing music that the artist might not have intended to share and the distrinction between an individual and the artist, due to the albums blurring the line between honoring an artist's legacy and capitalizing on it, especially when estates and labels continue to release projects long after the artist's death and many fans expressed concern about oversaturation and dilution of the rapper's legacy.
Tracklist
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Producer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Lost (intro)" | Jim Eastwood · Blake Duval | Iron Keys | 1:24 |
| 2. | "Losing Focus" | Duval · Dean Howard · Quinn Camacho · Marcus Damons | Iron Keys · LDX Rage · 2hotZero | 3:27 |
| 3. | "Not Much Left" (featuring Pluto) | Duval · Hendrix Rivera · Cole Savage | Quitmydayjob | 2:51 |
| 4. | "IDC" | Duval · Jonathan Saunders · Howard | Jonji · Iron Keys | 3:04 |
| 5. | "In A Minute" (featuring Blastoff and Yung Local) | Duval · Keyateh Zackery · Ken Terrell · Tyrone Davenport · Howard · Samuel McIntyre | Streetside · Iron Keys · HerbO | 4:25 |
| 6. | "Doing Damage" (featuring Jaynine and Pluto) | Duval · Jay Nolan · Rivera · Savage · Jonathon Gordon · Saunders · Erwin Röthke | Quitmydayjob · Jimmy 6ix · Jonji · Berlin on da track | 3:36 |
| 7. | "New Music (interlude)" | Eastwood · Duval | Iron Keys | 1:26 |
| 8. | "Like Me" (featuring Adan) | Duval · Jimmy Ives · Howard · Gerald Damons · Dolan Calder · Saunders | Iron Keys · Gun Gary · DCC · Jonji | 2:58 |
| 9. | "Frostbite" (featuring Trevon Rage) | Duval · Trevon Rage · Charles Harrison · Dominick Santos · Denzel Peters | 17Idol · BigStacksBP · Rage · Kidnsec · Third Nephew | 3:21 |
| 10. | "Slide" | Duval · Cody Gardenir | Formeh | 2:38 |
| 11. | "Counting Days" (featuring Kaison Dub) | Duval · Kailani Kahawaipela · Savage · Howard · M. Damons | Quitmydayjob · Iron Keys · 2hotZero | 3:01 |
| 12. | "Can't Stop" (featuring Pluto) | Duval · Rivera · Howard | Iron Keys | 2:40 |
| 13. | "Shooting Stars (interlude)" | Eastwood · Duval | Iron Keys | 1:23 |
| 14. | "My Enemy" | Duval · Korbin Sunn | SK99 | 2:56 |
| 15. | "Switching Up" | Duval · Saunders · Howard | Jonji · Iron Keys | 3:11 |
| 16. | "Hit List" (featuring Pluto) | Duval · Rivera · Leon Clark · Howard · G. Damons | Sw!tch · Iron Keys · Gun Gary | 4:17 |
| 17. | "Perfect" | Duval · Saunders · Howard | Jonji · Iron Keys | 2:22 |
| 18. | "Used To Be Down" | Duval · Howard | Iron Keys | 3:49 |
| 19. | "All The Time" | Duval · Howard · Sonny Olsen · Saunders | Iron Keys · BigStacksBP · Jonji | 3:04 |
| 20. | "Elevated" | Duval · Camacho · Howard · Saunders | LDX Rage · Iron Keys · Jonji | 2:01 |
| 21. | "No Rush (outro)" | Duval · Eastwood · Howard | Iron Keys | 2:22 |
| Total length: | 57:25 | |||
Notes