First things first, I must highlight that I dig many genres of music from just as many eras of popular culture. What’s happening to the soundtrack music featured in The Fast & The Furious, though, is a crime, and it’s offensive to F&F diehards.
2017 marks the 16th anniversary of the franchise. It all started in 2001 with the movie directed by Rob Cohen, a flick enhanced by a great selection of music used in key scenes. Funkmaster Flex to Limp Bizkit, DMX to Saliva, Ja Rule to seriously underrated produced and recording artist Benny Cassette, it all went together like a 426 V8 engine under the hood of a HEMI Dart.
For The Fate of The Furious, which has a release date set for April 14, 2017, the guy in charge of music took a turn for the worse. The utmost worst, to be more precise. As listed in the ending credits of Lil Uzi Vert, Quavo & Travis Scott’s music video for Go Off, artists who agreed to chip in with their songs for the soundtrack of the latest F&F movie are not exactly first-rate. Case in point: Pit Bull. Yes, that Pit Bull with the aural barf he passes off as music.
Ty Dolla $ign, Lil Yachty, G-Eazy, and Young Thug are on the list too. I dig hip-hop and rap culture, but these guys? They embody that Trans-Atlantic culture that we take for granted, enjoy it for a brief moment, and forget as soon as the next over-produced yet forgettable single hits the Billboard Hot 100.
Ask yourself this: will TY Dolla $ign’s song for F&F8 be listened a quarter of a century from now on as hip-hop fans listen today to Wu-Tang Clan’s hit singles from the 1993 debut album? Or A Tribe Called Quest's 'Can I Kick It?' The answer is pretty obvious, I'd say. And the worsening quality of The Fast & The Furious’ soundtracks has a peer in how the movies gradually shifted off from illegal street racing to action-packed paraphernalia, big explosions, and plot twists as unsurprising as my cat’s morning hairball.
Now that my rant is over, pay attention to the very start of the music video for Go Off. That’s a 2018 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon there, a 757-hp bruiser designed to blitz the 1/4-mile in a timely fashion. Here’s a question for you: can you imagine Lil Uzi Vert, Quavo or Travis Scott buying a Demon for the purpose the king of the muscle cars was built? I bet that’d be a ‘no.’
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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