The Singles Jukebox

Return of the prodigal cousin…

[Video]
[6.57]

Nortey Dowuona: I originally wrote something short, pithy and wrong, so I’m gonna drag my feet getting to the point with this one. Let me start with this: 1: Keem is good here. For one, his whining flow is so tightly locked in, it doesn’t make you notice the fact that his writing’s clumsy at best, and occasionally there is a startling vocal tic (the way he repeats “beat him up” is both exciting and threatening) that makes the riding of the beat switch so thrilling. But he’s only half, exactly half. Now the lukewarm take: 2: Kendrick is bad here. For God’s sake, he drops off the flow to throw, “IM SCARY, IVE GOT A GUN IN THIS BITCH.” You put this in the voice of Chance the Giftwrapper/Political Actor/Comic Influencer or Russ (the Eminem who Songs Good) or Travis Webster, it wouldn’t be classic or good or even funny. Plus the verse begins with Kendrick practicing his first 4 bars, on a professional song when he has been a pro rapper since 2009 instead of just delivering them with intensity THE FIRST TIME HE SAYS THEM. Also, how do we go from “I know if I’m generous at heart, I don’t need recognition/the way I’m rewarded, well, that’s God’s decision” to “I’m a prophet, I answer to Metatron and Gabriel” as well as “I’ve been ducking the overnight activists, yeah!” (Has Kendrick actually ever been in touch with any activists, especially in Compton?) The flow switches are so trite and half assed, especially when he starts telling us he comes from the 70, so when he does provide a dope line about getting to the right when the ambulance comes, he ruins it with a filler line and then hits us with the Yelawolf accent. And when he drops off the beat with the burn the hard drive line, it’s so goddamn awkward it makes you mad. Like, didn’t this guy use to be able to outrap Jay Z? What happened to calling out all your peers to get them ready to do duel with your raps? Tyler could outrap you now. So could J. Cole, KRIT, Wale AND Big Sean. Drake is a lost cause at this point, he’s getting washed by Lil Baby. Rocky is somewhere… doing something. Pusha T is two-timing his wife, being a father and is 44. Mac Miller sang better than you. And now we see rappers like Kenny Mason, noname, JID, Tierra Whack, SAbA, Junii, Little Simz, Dave, RAP Ferreira and especially Earl Sweatshirt, Angel Haze and Megan the Stallion, rap better than you. So calm down, go back to the pad, and write a better verse than Dave’s third on “Verdansk” and maybe people might be interested in a new record from you. But: 3: I still like this song. Baby Keem put in too much work for this to be a failure, and Cardo, Roselilah, Outtatown, Deats, Frankie Bash & Jasper Harris have created a titanic, 3 headed hydra for your earbuds. Plus, I used to like Yelawolf. However, I’d really prefer Kendrick be at least trying to justify all this smoking my top 5 from a man who’s a teetotaler.
[6]

Andy Hutchins: There is a lot here, and more of it’s bad than good: Keem’s delivery borrows from his cousin’s more, uh, experimental periods, and that plus his plodding flow would be grating even if he weren’t rapping — on his first song that virtually anyone has heard — like the artist people were actually coming to see on those world tours that saw him tag along. It’s a waste of those triumphal horns possibly left over from Jay Rock’s “WIN” or an attempt to remake it. But what is good is great. Keem’s cousin is one of the greatest rappers alive, of course, and the beat switch provides him with what sounds like a miniboss theme from some lost Super Nintendo RPG. The sneering, snarling, sarcastic performance befits a tiger growling its announcement of a return to the hunt, knowing damn well nothing in the jungle is a threat.
[5]

Mark Sinker: He’s huge now but he’s also in his head — who isn’t this last year and more? — and so the thoughts become just thumps and cracks circling more and more tightly, overlapping, hysterical, a frantic frightening controlled inner mythopoeia just beyond the edges of sense, where words become abstract percussion and emotions become a lethal blurring drone and gestures flare like petit mal…
[10]

Juana Giaimo: My favorite transition is the first one. The brass sample stops, we are left a few seconds with Baby Keem’s rap alone and suddenly a very dreamy synth appears, giving a completely different vibe to the song. The following transitions are abrupt cuts; they almost seem to have copy pasted each section, making it hard to listen to it as a whole. It doesn’t help that both Baby Keem and Kendrick Lamar opted to fire words one after the other in a rather tiring high tone and with little flow at all. 
[5]

Alfred Soto: With horns flattened as if if it were 2006 and Timbaland-Timberlake ruled, “Family Ties” depends on the transition from Baby Keem’s syllable-at-a-time rapping to Kendrick Lamar’s impatience, force, and trademarked long lines. No discrete sections, blessedly: Keem returns in the second half, a genuine duet.
[6]

Al Varela: Kendrick so easily steals the show on “Family Ties” that it’s easy to forget that Baby Keem holds his own on the first half of the song. The flow starts out a bit basic against the horn beat, but his loose, fun energy eases you into the song as he slowly brings on faster flows and more intensity, pulling through when the beat switches and his nasal voice goes from funny to intimidating. I think that’s why Baby Keem stands out over a lot of other newcomers. His rapping is short and simple, but it’s the meshing of several beats and styles that make each song feel like a journey. In which case, Kendrick is the sleeping dragon at the end of the tunnel. And yes, obviously his verse is tremendous. It’s insane to hear him switch between different voices and flows at a rapid-fire pace. Not to mention there’s a bit of goofiness to his lyrics, so even if this verse is meant to reclaim his spot on the throne, he does it with a loose sense of fun that we haven’t seen as much of from him before. The whole song builds to its best moment, where Baby Keem comes back and throws bars with Kendrick back and forth. A victory lap within a song that was already victorious. 
[8]

Ian Mathers: Flexing as an end in itself (aesthetically as much as anything else); the Keem half is good, but the Kendrick half is better (bars and production both). Were I a rapper “Family Ties” would very much make me want to never attract either of their attention, which definitely feels like the goal.
[6]