The cover art for ‘Days Before Rodeo.’
Travis Scott has risen to the level of a true superstar: a genuine mover in seemingly every space he steps into—music, footwear, clothing, you name it. Long before he stamped stadium sellouts, though, he was a Houston up-and-comer, scrapping for placements on bigger artists’ work and promoting his own music in the mixtape circuit. One of the earliest major Travis Scott releases, Days Before Rodeo, just hit streaming services in celebration of its 10th anniversary. Here’s a retrospective breakdown of the LP and how it sounds a decade later.
Looking Back On Days Before Rodeo Casts Superstars In A New Light
Part of what makes this project so compelling ten years later is the cast of characters it assembles. The members of Migos, all absolutely in their prime, each contribute contenders for “best verse of the record” on “Sloppy Toppy.” Quavo particularly showcases why his status as the best of the trio was largely undisputed. (Quavo has a knack for turning in all-career performances alongside Scott, but that’s a story for another time). A rare sight in the time, Peewee Longway appears at the tail end of the high-energy trap banger. He was already very much neck-and-neck alongside defining faces of trap music. During that period, Longway was unofficially named the “4th member” of Migos, a title passed around between a few other MCs, many of whom also appear on DBR.
The snapshot quality of this tape unfortunately also cuts in the opposite direction. Such is the case with the tension between Young Thug & Rich Homie Quan that arose following DBR‘s release. The duo held some of the best in-studio chemistry of the mid-2010s. They birthed iconic songs like “Mamacita” (included here) and Rich Gang’s “Lifestyle.” There’s hence a bittersweet quality playing the single in 2024. It’s hard to not imagine what could’ve been if not for some testy extracurriculars that halted their extremely promising catalog and hit the brakes on a long-teased collab album.
Nonetheless, “Mamacita” is the best of Days Before Rodeo in a nutshell. It combines a cowboy atmosphere with A-plus efforts by everyone involved, from Scott’s psychedelic, heavily processed signature here to some solitary production by Metro Boomin to unchained verses from both Quan & Thug.
Some Of Travis Scott’s Moodiest, Most Conceptual Tracks
No discussion of this 2014 mixtape would be complete without a mention of “Drugs You Should Try It.” Since the project’s release, the song has become an in-joke within and outside of Scott’s fanbase. It’s cited as “criminally underrated” with a frequency that clashes with that term’s definition. It’s an excellent song still, and taps into the woozy atmosphere that eventually became the foundation for the Houston MC’s rock star persona: “We rock the club / We both throw up / We was the band you never heard before.”
To that point, many of the songs here speak to an aesthetic Travis Scott accomplished more easily on Days Before Rodeo when he wasn’t the face of multiple corporate collaborations. Tracks like “Zombies” or “Grey,” dedicated to drug-addled nights, hangovers & waking up in the evening to start it all again, simply wouldn’t fly anymore. The universes he crafts on subsequent efforts like ASTROWORLD or Utopia are far larger in scale, populated by the likes of Kanye West, Beyonce or The Weeknd, but it’s almost nostalgic to remember the humbler, grimier beginnings of the Travis Scott enterprise.
With the cult classic status that Days Before Rodeo gained since release, making it so widely accessible is a reminder of the importance Scott places on his personal relationship with fans. Now stratospheres ahead of where he was in 2014, surely a host of new fans will familiarize themselves with the start of his journey, arguably a high point for those who have been with him the whole way.
You can finally find Days Before Rodeo on streaming services everywhere, along with everything in the Travis Scott catalog.
Elsewhere in our coverage, The Avett Brothers tour adds a slew of new dates as they make their way across the US.
