The Fall-Off And How J. Cole Became Rap’s Bradley Cooper

In the cruel eternity of the internet, no one gets a consolation prize for taking an L on national TV. Not even bright-eyed Bradley Cooper. After spending six years practicing one particular conductor symphony scene and donning an abominable prosthetic mask for the Leonard Bernstein biopic Maestro, Cooper found himself on the losing end of the Oscar race for Best Actor and a series of jokes labeling an awards season clout-chaser. We can't know for sure, but there's a chance J. Cole felt a similar sting 15 years ago. 

No one's ever wanted a classic album more than J. Cole. Titled Cole World: A Sideline Story, his 2011 debut LP was framed in the theatrical gravitas of Maestro without the genuine brilliance to earn similar acclaim. Following a few solid but unspectacular follow-ups, Cole's used the last eight years for an extended rollout for the album he hinted would be his last. In that time, he's rapped his ass off with stellar guest verses. When not doing that, he's been dropping more middling albums while developing goofy gimmicks and leading the field in the Fake Cryptic Artist Olympics; it's not an ethnic nose prop, but a rap alter ego named Kill Edward is similarly unforgivable. Accompanying the first bit of music shared from his alleged final album The Fall-Off, he wrote that he wanted to "do on my last what I was unable to do on my first." Released last week, the project is an ambitious, technically accomplished double album that's occasionally weighed down by its own pretentiousness.

Sprawling and fiery, The Fall-Off is a collage of unexpected textures, sprightly verbal athleticism, and ideas from all corners of J. Cole's influences. On the back of the literal CD, you can see what appears to be a setup of his old bedroom: a boombox surrounded by posters of Beanie Sigel, Common, 50 Cent, Canibus, and other folks who could fill out your I Love Early 2000s Rap Vol. 3 CD. The album sounds like he dumped those CDs in a molten pot with his street-adjacent everyman sensibilities — a Mobb Deep sample here; a Common sample there; an embarrassing but real admission way over there. Threading it all is his dexterity. For hometown anthem "Two Six," Cole sprints across a fluttering orchestral arrangement while interpolating Sexyy Red's "Skee Yee." Toward the end of the first verse, he lays out a mission statement for the album he intended to be his best. His syllables bounce atop each other like they're tap dancing on a tightrope: "That shit feel old to me, my cribs, they never get sold to me/ Them bitches get built for me/ Like cheerleaders, I'm steppin' on these niggas skillfully." 

Cole's ear for phonetics and syntactical precision have made him one of the more obviously impressive rappers in the mainstream. These aren't the hazy hieroglyphs of Armand Hammer, nor the annoying but rewarding quadruple entendres of Lupe Fiasco. It's "go into Hot 97 and drop a viral freestyle anytime you want" incarnate. That ability has perhaps given him more artistic credit than he might deserve, but combined with his commercial appeal and everyman psychology, it cemented his status as a linear, classical sort of rap star from a different time. Obviously, all of that's here, too. For "The Fall Off Is Inevitable" (released as an advance single under the name "DISC 2 TRACK 2"), Cole raps his life story backwards, from casket to birth. It feels a bit gimmicky, but his ability to connect it all with just one rhyme scheme, and the seamlessness of the story itself, outweigh that fault; this is a cleaner version of Nas' "Rewind." 

Cole developed a reputation for rapping rapping back when the iPhone first came out. But that technical proficiency wouldn't have hit the same if he couldn't use it to channel his emotions. The pyrotechnics are the floor, but Cole's greatness lies in his ability to funnel memories and sensations into a portrait of a Fayetteville, NC kid with a dream, skills, and the fearless insecurities to make you hope he reaches it. On tracks like "Safety," those gifts coalesce, with Cole spitting from the perspective of a homie texting about all that's transpired in the Ville since he's been gone. Clumsily homophobic as the third verse is, the song's Earthly details and economic precision paint a portrait of friends fallen and floating — dreams dead and nonexistent. 

Cole is more affecting the more personal he gets. Floating over a dreamy Isley Brothers sample for penultimate track "and the whole world is the Ville," Cole gets even more personal, telling the story of a gangly teen who found courage in skating rink cyphers. Paired with sentimental piano keys, it becomes a serene tribute to the otherwise tributeless: "Now, this tale was composed for those/ Who arose within this lil' area code on the globe /Like the rose that grows from out the concrete abode/ You gotta just go, no matter the goal/ You're from a beautiful, but not reputable place/ You seen your fair share of funeral dates."

The songwriting here is sensory and acrobatic. But that's all customary Cole. So is the "I was just your average bro with a dream" content, which some folks are tired of. But he leaps forward with some sonic innovation, flaunting some ingenuity that collapses eras and arguments about his production acumen. "Who TF Iz U"  mixes Mobb Deep's "Drop A Gem" with a Memphis cowbell for a cross-regional structure that works a little better than it should. Meanwhile, "Bombs In The Ville/Hit The Gas" phases from supple strings into an astral Miami bass beat with a flourish of a Ludacris "What's Your Fantasy" sample stitched into the ending. On paper, an Alchemist-produced cut with Cole, Future, and TEMS sounds like either a hideous monstrosity or a beautiful Frankensteinian creation. With Alc's eerie bells, Hendrix's wounded croaks, and TEMS just being TEMS, it leans toward the latter, even if Cole is the least interesting part of the track and it feels a bit too segmented to completely capitalize on its ingredients. Swirled together, the spurts of mosaical production give the album a sense of propulsion that almost keeps you from realizing it's a little too long. 

The Fall-Off's highs will mostly make you forget its lows. Technically speaking, Cole's singing shows cleaner range on tracks like "39 Intro," but the accompanying guitar evokes a sappy trailer for The Notebook 3. Ditto for "Legacy." It's theoretically neat that Cole maybe took some vocal lessons, but the strained jaggedness he showed on tracks like "Apparently" and "Work Out" gave his best tracks character in a way this pristine okayness doesn't. His singing is a little more convincing on "The Let Out." 

There aren't many duds here, but Cole is definitely prestige-hunting, with some tracks feeling like a directory for hackneyed rap tropes. It can feel a little tired. For "What If," he raps from the perspective of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G., serving up the sort of kiss-and-make-up story he frankly has no business telling. Somewhere, Joyner Lucas is jealous. The "I Used To Love H.E.R." sequel "I Love Her Again" is effective enough but still only makes me think of the kid showing me the OG version on his iPod Nano in 7th grade homeroom: "SEE! The 'girl' he's talking about is HIP-HOP." It's a layer of self-indulgent heavy-handedness that telegraphs its importance in the same way Cole's done since he had a Jay-Z interview about a potential successor stitched into "Rise And Grind." Cole takes sonic risks, but the hooks here don't hook like his best work, lacking the symbolism and phonetic thrills to be indelible. It's a little telling that Future growling "Fuck the world, let's run a train" might be the best chorus on the whole thing. 

Despite its choppy moments, The Fall-Off is one of Cole's more accomplished works. It's not shackled to an overwrought concept like KOD, and it's technically sharper than Sideline Story. It's more experimental than Born Sinner but lacks the towering anthems of 2014 Forest Hills Drive. It's not as clean as The Off-Season, but it's riskier in a rewarding way. The Fall-Off was never truly going to be J. Cole's final album; in an AMA on his Inevitable forum Monday, he admitted that his project It's A Boy will still be released, but he might be done making music as "J. Cole." Fucking yawn. This was all about as unpredictable as Steve Rogers coming back to the MCU one day. Still, that means Cole's got more time to prove he hasn't fallen off. And he hasn't. The Fall-Off isn't his crowning achievement, but it's trying to be something interesting — and it mostly succeeds. Heartless memes aside, that's worth something. Trophy or not.

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