Though fans of any artist signed to California’s Top Dawg Entertainment are familiar with long waits between projects, the hiatus of ScHoolboy Q is one of the more speculated about for any musician in that camp. Family life, tragedy and everything in between contributed to a five-year gap between 2018’s CrasH Talk and the next project. At long last, the wait is drawing to a close as ScHoolboy Q begins ramping up once again with his newest single, “Yeern 101.”
“Yeern 101” Finds ScHoolboy Q in Prime Form
Built on a sparse, “Love Lockdown”-like palette of 808s, “Yeern 101” is, formally, very stripped back. Though maybe not as boisterous as it, “Numb Numb Juice”—from the leadup cycle for ScHoolboy’s last project, CrasH Talk—still very much informs the choices made here. Lasting just over a minute, it feels like “Yeern 101” is over almost just as it starts, no doubt due to the nonstop, rapid-fire flow that the LA MC adopts over it. Still, don’t take the bite-sized nature of the single to mean a lack of density. Q is just as sharp and pointed as ever, reaching an apex towards the middle of his verse where he raps:
“N*** how you live with no spine? Broke n**** better off dyin’
Man, you n****s got nerve, broke a**, need to get a bird
F*** it, I’ma get it off first, from the way you ain’t surf
You b**** n****s lookin’ all hurt, funny ’til your ego got nerfed”
Though “Yeern 101” is functionally the lead single, with the past two ScHoolboy Q tracks dubbed as “album previews,” we’re beginning to get a shape for what the upcoming Blue Lips album will sound like. “Yeern 101” is no doubt the most aggressive of the bunch, but more minimal production seems to be a growing theme, with the TDE rapper getting space to shine instead. And he is totally up to the task, as precise and driven on the mic as we’ve ever heard him.
You can find “Yeern 101” on streaming platforms and listen to ScHoolboy Q’s other two recently released tracks on his official YouTube page.
