With only a few collabs between rappers Earl Sweatshirt and Mike on songs like “Please Don’t Cut my Wings” and “Sentry,” fans loved the chemistry between Mike and Earl Sweatshirt. The two artists made “Pompeii//Utility” on Apr. 3, a plugg album, with the producing collective Surf Gang, coming at a staggering 33 track double album.
This was the first album since Earl’s “Live Laugh Love” album and Mike’s released “Tiny Desk” performance tracks from his album “Showbiz.” Though most fans had hoped for the album to be “abstract hip-hop,” with the typical dense lyricism on production inspired by jazz, soul and lofi production, the duo alternatively had Surf Gang produce ambient plugg beats throughout, being airy and trap inspired and much faster. Surf Gang, responsible for producing “Pompeii//Utility,” is a NYC rapping and producing crew founded in 2018, by the producer Evilgiane, which had worked alongside Kendrick Lamar and Baby Keem, A$ap Rocky and XavierSoBased in the past.
The Album:
The album takes a weird spin on a double album, with Mike taking the first half, “Pompeii,” while Earl takes the second half “Utility,” reminiscent of Outkast’s “Speakerboxxx/The Love Below” and Saint Pepsi and Luxury Elite’s “Late Night Delight,” only sharing two songs together on “Kirkland” and “Potbelly.” Together, the album is 33 tracks, but is only one hour and four minutes total in length, making most of the tracks fairly short. On top of that, there were six features which had elevated the album’s quicker pace. Both Earl Sweatshirt and Mike showcased their usual dense clever lyricism throughout the album.
One of my favorite aspects of the album was how fun it is. It’s obvious to see that everyone who made the project was enjoying themselves. This was highlighted by rapper Mike when he said, “The highlighted lyrics to me had been Mike’s line on the opener ‘The Fall’ with ‘someone bring a worthy opponent,’” which I especially loved due to its ability to set the mood for the album. Casa Grande senior Geovany Argon Cruz stated about the song “AOK”: “I don’t think it’s my type of song, but I like it. [Earl Sweatshirt] is really mumbly though. But I still liked the song, especially the production.”
My Opinion:
After listening to the album quite a bit, I would say this was a pretty enjoyable project from Earl and Mike. Even though this is an unusual style for them, both had seemed comfortable on the beats and flourished on Surf Gang’s production. Though at times the production was a bit repetitive, I think it works in its favor, making it feel very cohesive and tied together. The use of sound effects was really cleverly done — Surf Gang had used a police siren sounding much similar to the sirens used on Mike’s Pinball pretty often and added a lot of repetition that I would say was very fun. This wasn’t the only sound effect used, as others like the Zelda “Hey, listen!” and other car sounds were also frequently used.
I like the unique twist with Mike on one half and Earl Sweatshirt on the other, but I wish they both had a few more songs together. Tracks where the two were together seem the most fun, in my opinion. In the future, it would be nice to see another collaboration. I would really enjoy it if the two tried more abstract productions together, something similar to “Some Rap Songs” and “Beware of the Monkey,” where the production was jazz and Vaporwave-inspired. I would say “Pompeii//Utility” was an above average album from the three artists.
Overall Consensus:
I would recommend this album, especially to people who are big fans of Mike and Earl Sweatshirt. Fans of Mike’s Pinball projects would definitely enjoy this. People who have been liking the recent plugg trend from the 2020s would also enjoy this album. Although, people who are not familiar with Mike and Earl might struggle to enjoy the album due to its density.
