Tyler, The Creator, real name Tyler Okonma, has been a part of the mainstream hip-hop and rap scene since his single “Yonkers” became a huge hit in 2011, with him describing this as the moment he knew he made it in his 2021 album “Call Me If You Get Lost”. However, it has been his recent successes that have been the most important of his entire career, with his newest album cementing him as one of the greatest songwriters/producers of our generation, if not all time. 

With the release of Chomakopia, Tyler, The Creator has now had significant success with all of his last 4 albums. Flower Boy was seen as a large shift in Okonma’s musical style and was his first big success with an album, being nominated at the Grammy’s for Best Rap Album in 2018. He followed this up with his greatest success, Igor. Completely written, composed and arranged by Okonma, it was a new avenue for creativity for Tyler, The Creator. The Alternative RNB album took the public by storm, eventually being nominated and winning the Best Rap Album Grammy in 2020. His next album to follow would again win Best Rap Album in 2022, with Tyler, The Creator truly beginning to establish himself as one of the few at the top of the rap game.

Chromakopia had the insanely tough task of following up two Grammy-winning albums and one of the greatest album runs of all time. There was infinitely more space for this album to ruin his run than continue it. Yet, Tyler, The Creator delivered with this project yet again. Just like Igor, the album is completely produced by Tyler Okonma; it contains a diverse array of genres, swaying between hard-hitting rap, relaxing beats and flows reminiscent of Igor’s production, a rock-influenced track sampling Ngozi Family, a Zambian band from the 1970s, and a beautiful piano ballad. The range Tyler, The Creator shows on this album alone is an incredible feat, proving to everyone that he is truly one of the special composers and producers of our generation. 

However, Okonma’s production isn’t the only part of the album that stands out. The songwriting and storytelling that occurs throughout the album are often heart-wrenching, extremely open and vulnerable tellings of issues that Okonma is either currently dealing with or has dealt with in his rise to fame and music in general. 

In “Noid”, he expresses the ways that he has become incredibly paranoid due to his fame, feeling that his life has lost its privacy. He addresses the intense fear he had with a pregnancy scare in the past on “Hey Jane”. Okonma tells of a past sexual partner who committed suicide on “Judge Judy”. “Take Your Mask Off” highlights the ways people hide their true selves, such as a man with a wife and kids who is secretly gay and an Ivy League-bound kid who ends up in jail trying to look cool in gang culture.  He attempts to deal with his mother aging and feeling pressured into family life because of that on “Tomorrow”. Above all this, “Like Him” is a painful song expressing Tyler’s difficulty growing up without a father, feeling incredible disdain and hatred for them being absent, which is present in much of his early work, while his mom continues to tell him how much Tyler, the Creator reminds her of his father. At the end of the song, Okonma’s mother reveals that his father has always wanted to be a part of his life, but his mom is the one keeping him away.

The messages that are spread throughout the album are incredibly heavy and difficult to talk about, yet Okonma traverses all of them beautifully. Not only does the album stand as a testament to Tyler, The Creator’s ability in production, but his storytelling has continued to impress people throughout his discography. Chromakopia is the culmination of each skill that Tyler, The Creator has been carefully developing over the course of his entire career, specifically since the release of his project Wolf in 2013, which was his most expansive album when released. 

While it is ultimately not his best project, Chromakopia is the most balanced, well-constructed album that Okomna has ever released, which is an insanely high bar given his previous work. Not only is this quite possibly the greatest 4 album run in history, but we have had the privilege of watching it all happen in real-time, witnessing the progression of Tyler, The Creator into the greatest producer and a top songwriter of our generation of musicians. If you haven’t taken the time to listen to Tyler, The Creator before, I implore you to start now.