Fivio, once a spongelike apprentice to Pop Smoke despite his seniority, occasionally leaned toward a cautionary tale. In the two-and-a-half years since inking a seven-figure deal with a major label, the man born in East Flatbush’s Maxi Riles III has endured the murders of two close friends and associates, and has been arrested twice, making his Own musical development is delayed. ,
Yet through some combination of perseverance and circumstances – including a stylistic breakthrough he landed behind bars – Fivio has also become perhaps Drill’s greatest and best hope to settle into something less precarious. “My role is not to let the drill die down,” he said. “Just like it’s feeding me, it’s feeding other people too.”
On “Bible,” the rapper tries to tread an unconventional sound down a more traditional path: smoothing the street edge of the drill into something safely marketable.
Melodic and radio-ready, the album, like many major-label rap debuts before it, relies on vocal guests (KC, Vori, Lil Tje) and exclusively female voices (Keys, Queen Naija, Chloe Bailey). More public appeal. In line with Drill’s evolutionary lurch toward musical familiarity known as the “sample drill”, the big budgets of Destiny’s Child’s “Say My Name,” Ellie Goulding’s “Lights” and Ne-Yo’s “So Sick”, There are also pop-oriented flavors. everywhere.
Gun and gang talk, figurative or otherwise, is purposefully exaggerated, though it’s also there (see: “Slime Them,” a pure growl, or “Left Side,” which makes more sense for Fivio’s longstanding Crip affiliation. points to). But overall, Fivio said that with the on-message discipline of a politician, he’s hoping to decouple the drill’s distinctive musical quirks from its expected subject matter.
