Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight is Travis Scott’s wonderfully crafted sophomore album with guest appearances from André 3000, Kid Cudi (a classic), Cassie, Young Thug, Nav, Blac Youngsta, 21 Savage, Kendrick Lamar (another great artist), Bryson Tiller, Quavo, K. Forest and The Weeknd (my favorite appearance).

Unlike Scott’s debut album Days Before Birds which was met with negative reviews, this album shows music critics that anybody can grow as an artist, producing creations superior than the last. Birds in the Trap Sing McKnight runs for about 53 minutes which is great if you want to  listen to music while you’re in class. With that settled, let’s begin the review.

Covering all thirteen songs would be excruciating for my hands and for Mr. Wozniak to go through and grade, so I’ll spare the both of us that pain and cover my two favorite songs from the album: “guidance” and “goosebumps”(yes, the songs aren’t capitalized).

“guidance” features K Forest with a beat that drops harder than my cousin when he fell in a cooler at my sister’s 2nd birthday 10 years ago. On top of the fast paced percussion is a noise which resembles the hyper cheers of euphoria. I’m going to be honest here, I didn’t know K Forest was featured on this until I looked it up. Both artists sound so similar when it comes to their singing, but re-listening to the song, it becomes apparent that K Forest has a higher pitch than Travis Scott. While the song itself can make anybody want to get up and dance their sorrows away, it’s essential to know that the hook apprehends the rhythm of the flow and the beat. To quote it:

“I roll up behind it, I wanna try it

Grip on your waist, bust up the place, tantalizin’

You need some guidance, you stay wildin’

I’ma guide you like a pilot

Haven’t been around this year

I like to see you change your gears

To a motion that’s more faster, babe

I’m grippin’ like I’m tryna catch up, babe”

I wish I could sample some audio on this audio to show you just how stunning the instrumental is ,but that isn’t possible, so I recommend listening to the song on your own time.

Getting back on track here, the bars flow so smooth that it’s basically a musical representation of putting lotion on when you’re ashy. It’s nice, smooth, and it feels so hairsplitting to hear/do. The fact that flow like this exists on Earth gives me a reason to live. Jokes aside though, you should really listen to this song if you want to experience a rhythm to bust down to, lyrics about calling someone out, and bars that flow like the Nile River.

Up next on my list, “goosebumps” which features the amazing Kendrick Lamar. Listening to this song, you can feel the chaos and rapidness of a rio1t, but also a feeling of something coming. As in, something’s coming to stop/pause the riot or something. It’s complicated but whatever. Whereas “guidance” delivers an upbeat and hyper percussion, “goosebumps” gives the listener a more raw, forceful beat. The song details Travis in love with a woman—swooning over her to the point where he gets literal goosebumps. The tremendous amount of love that Travis harbors is apparent in the opening lines of the song, where Travis raps the following:

“I get those goosebumps every time, yeah, you come around, yeah

You ease my mind, you make everything feel fine

Worry about those condoms, and way too numb, yeah

It's way too drum, yeah”

Whenever you fall in love with someone, you get this inexplicable feeling where your life seems dull, daunting, and overall black and white until that special someone comes in and brings color into your world. This is the feeling Travis raps about in goosebumps. In a romantic relationship, there is a balance of love for someone’s well being and lust for their body. Too much of either of the latter can damage the relationship. While Scott lyrically tells us about the love, Kendrick sings about the lust in a relationship.

Sex has been an important thing since the beginning of time, but in this day and age, it’s become a sacred practice between couples. The lyrics Kendrick raps about here are a colorful painting of how we treat sex: we’d do anything for it. It’s something addictive, just like food or drugs. Steering out of that topic because this an age appropriate essay, the songs in this album are not only stellar, but this, in my opinion, has to be Travis Scott’s magnum opus.