J. Cole, the man who got away, has been relatively quiet since he wisely if cornily removed himself from the Drake/Kendrick Lamar beef, which he never should've gotten involved in in the first place. A few months ago, Cole shared "Port Antonio," the song where he laid out his feelings on his side-character role in that whole saga. Now, Cole appears to be moving on. Last night, he shared another new track, and it's got nothing to do with the bigger rap narrative. Instead, it's Cole back in the multisyllabic-philosopher zone where he probably belongs.
Last month, Cole turned 40, and he launched a blog called the Algorithm. For the most part, it's the place to find Inevitable, the paid career-retrospective podcast that he's been making with Ibrahim Hamad. But last night, Cole used the site to post a new song called "cLOUDs": "just wanted to share. made this a few days ago, then i added a second verse and was like 'man I got a blog now, I can put whatever I want up there.'" (Cole says that it was produced by DZL and Omen, with "small contributions from me.")
Over a contemplative, Fender Rhodes-heavy beat, Cole gets into subjects like his own age and the dark implications of streaming subscriptions and "AI regimes." He also raps his ass off. Consider this bit: "I’m that bass in your trunk, the bullet that missed Trump/ The gun that jammed 'cause it seemed God had other plans/ The son of man extending his hand to Son Of Sam/ In forgiveness, for all of the homicides we witnessed/ The over-dramatized, the traumatized with sickness/ Thrown in the pan and caramelized for richness/ And served on a plate with sirloin steak/ To billionaires who don’t care the world’s gon' break." I mean, that's pretty good. You can make fun of Cole's self-seriousness and self-importance all day, but the flow is impeccable. Listen below.
"cLOUDs" isn't on streaming services right now, and maybe it never will be.
