I want everyone to understand one thing; I am not trying to fight about this, this is completely my opinion. However, the word “mid” has become the ultimate drive by opinion. One word that dismisses years of work. And lately that word just gets thrown around especially at albums that don’t give you an immediate dopamine hit. It is not critique, it is impatience. We are witnessing a culture that demands a music to impress us immediately or else. The hard truth is that every album is not designed to go viral. Some albums are made to not resonate at the time it was released. Some albums weren’t made for the first listen, but the fifth or sixth. Listen I am not going to sit here and defend albums that just flopped or pretend that ever one of those experimental projects is genius. It is about making space for the kind of art that takes time. That asks something for you. The kind that waits patiently until you’re ready to hear it.
So how did we get here, well like every other issue with music it is about consumerism. But in case you dont know what I am talking about I will review. Streaming made music more accessible than ever, but also accelerated the life cycle of an album. A project can drop at midnight and by 12:15 people are already on twitter typing “mid”. YouTubers post “first reaction” videos before the second verse ends. TikTok will grab a clip and drag it into the ground. Especially in this climate the idea of a slow burn has been replaced by a quick hit. An album like Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers with nonlinear therapy arcs, spoken word confessions, and disjointed production was not going to win the instant herald Olympics. It is an uncomfortable album to listen to because it is about discomfort. It is not designed to be bumped, it is designed to sit. But the reaction online? Mid. Too talky. No one is going to bump this. We have trained ourselves to consume music like short form content. We dont give it the same patience we give TV shows or long books. The algorithm rewards immediacy not introspection.
There are a few albums that aged like wine. Sometimes the world wasn’t ready and sometimes it is you werent ready.
Endless - Frank Ocean
Unless you are a huge Frank Ocean fan you either haven’t heard about this album at all or just never listened to it. Which is unfortunate, the album was released before Blonde and was a visual album, he released it to get out of his contract and can only be found on Apple Music. Sounds super boring to be fair, but it is super important. It is part installation art, part meditation. It feels like a spiritual cousin to Blonde, but has a more mature theme while Blonde focused on both maturity and youth.
Everything is Love - The Carters
When this dropped Beyoncé fans were wanting another Lemonade and Jay fans were wanting another 4:44 but were mad they got those albums’ sequel. An album about Black love, wealth, ownership, and intimacy. Delivered calmly inside the Louvre. You can’t listen to this album correctly if you are looking for the messiness of a relationship. This is about peace. This is about forgiving. You just weren’t ready for it.
New Blue Sun - André 3000
The reviews of this album were so loud. Even before it was released and stacks told us what this album was going to contain “No Bars?” ”Flute Music”. Yep, that is what it was. An ambient jazz odyssey is what he needed to make. His first solo album was a challend to hyper productivity, to rap expectations, to linear thought. The first song was literally called “I really Wanted to Make a “Rap” Album But This Is Literally The Way The Wind Blew Me This Time” this album breathes in a way most of us don’t. That is not an issue, it’s the point.
Slay-Z - Azealia Banks
As problematic as she is, she gave us an ahead of it’s time house/rap 90s throwbacks. Full vocal performances and experimental production. All for free, but yall let drama overshadow the fact that half of this album should have been tearing through the club scene. The Big Big Beat is finally getting some love in the underground DJ scene but Azealia knew what the album was, everyone else is just catching up.
You’re Dead! - Flying Lotus
Unless you are a funk listener you might not know who Flying Lotus is short description is he is a frequent collaborator with other funk artists like Thunder Cat. He was even praised by George Clinton for his work. I wanted to clarify this as a precursor to this statement as it simplifies his work too much: He was the reason To Pimp a Butterfly had the sound it did. The funk influence is a direct result of him and his collaboration with Kendrick Lamar. And if you take the time to compare it to this album which was recorded at around the same time you can definitely hear it so much so it even features Kendrick Lamar on Never Catch Me and shares some collaborators with the album. This album feels like an insane acid trip and when it dropped no one knew what to do with it. But if you listen to it now, it sounds like it was made for the future.
Cowboy Carter - Beyoncé
Probably Beyoncé’s most conterversial album exploring the roots of not only country music but the roots of black history in music, this album covered themes like love, parenthood, religion, and patriotism. All of the things that make a good country album, well it was not received that way. Receiving push back from country institutions almost immediately and still currently, really solidified what the album stood for. If you listen to the album while considering this it almost feels like she saw into the future. Even in the opening track Ameriican Requiem with the current state of the country the erasure of Black voices, it feels like she is holding a mirror to America and asking “Who is America for? Whose stories fet told?”
These are just a few albums that felt ahead of their time ( I will make a playlist with these and more and link it to the top) but what exactly makes an album ahead of its time? Well in my opinion it usually means one of these things: It has experimental productions (a pallete you don’t recognize yet), It has unstructured storytelling, It is genre fluid, the cultural timing is ahead, and/or it demands patience from the listener. Most of these are extremely difficult for an artist to sell in a culture built on the skip button, but when artist are willing to sacrifice that to actually create the reward is rarely celebrated. It unfortunately is not a fault in the system, it is the system. The music industry and music journalism in particular, often rewards safety and familiarity. That’s why trends feel like waves; something hits and it just keeps coming at different frequencies and weights and those keep going until the next shift. But those who create that shift often get crucified first. This is especially true for Black artists. The second a Black artist steps outside their assigned lane whether it is trap, R&B, or conscious rap they get questioned. Called boring, weird, pretentious, entitled. Meanwhile their white counterparts get called “visionary” and “genre defying”. Azealia Banks gets copied without credit, André 3000 is doing what white indie darlings get praised for, Beyoncé does what Post Malone and Chappel Roan are doing and only one receives push back. That is not an accident, that is a cultural pattern.
So what is mid. Well my theory is that it is code for “I don’t get it yet.” It is not a final judgement, it is a current snapshot of what your current taste, mood, level of engagement, and how you interact with music is. And like any snapshot it can change. Maybe you were distracted wanted something to dance to and not something to heal you, or something catchy instead of something true. Next time you’re tempted to call something mid just say “This isn’t for me right now” and leave a little space to revist it when life shifts. When you shift.
In conclusion somethings are made for when you are ready. Some albums aren’t made for the charts. They are made for you later. Later, when you are healing. Later, when you are questioning things. Later, when you’ve slowed down enough to hear the wind in a flute. You didn’t miss it. You just weren’t ready yet. So dust that album off and give it another listen. Sit with it, let it breath, give it the space to move through you. Because the music didn’t change, but you did.
