Tyler, the Creator is an anomaly. For nearly a decade he has been everything and nothing to a culture that wasn’t fully prepared for the change him and his childhood friends foreshadowed. Armed with the internet, endless Neptunes-inspired chords, music software, and a dream, came Odd Future and its leader Tyler, the Creator.
At times Tyler, seemed like he was following in the footsteps of Marshall Mathers, hellbent on shocking the world into submission, while simultaneously becoming the biggest rapper alive in the process. At other times Tyler has sought to break free of the shackles of his own making and pursue the pastures of pop production like his mentor Pharrell before him.
There have been four solo studio album, one scene-stealing debut tape, countless releases with Odd Future and all along the way Tyler has manifested his perverse fun world reality on to the public like a Supreme-obsessed Willy Wonka. However, with the release of Scum Fuck Flower Boy, Tyler is charting a new course. Gone are the shackles of a father that abandoned him. The horrorcore influence has been erased, and in its wake symbolism of flowers and the beauty of nature abound. The kid that made the world quake in fear is coming into his own.
Flower Boy is an awakening. Sexuality, creative freedom, and economic empowerment overflow on Tyler’s fourth studio album, but it wouldn’t be possible without the awkward phases that got him here. The years of problematic lyrics aren’t erased. For every exceptional Tyler beat, there is often one that circles into experimental oblivion. Early 2009-2010 punchlines have aged like an avocado in an abandoned Chipotle.
Regardless, we’ve tracked Tyler’s growth in front of our eyes. He’s consistently leveled-up against peers like A$AP Rocky and Earl Sweatshirt, while running laps around veterans like The Game and Pusha T. Below are the songs that got Tyler here and proved that no matter what anyone said, he was always going to stick around.
29. "Okaga, CA" f/ Leon Ware, Clementine Creevy, & Alice Smith
28. "Awkward"
27. "Analog 2" f/ Tyler the Creator, Syd & Frank Ocean
26. "Rusty" f/ Domo Genesis & Earl Sweatshirt
25. “I Ain’t Got Time”
24. "Answer" f/ Syd
23. "Couch" f/ Tyler the Creator
Album: Earl (2010)
Earl’s lackadaisical flow spreads across any song he’s on like dark molasses creeping along a smooth surface. Sweatshirt’s way of using double entendres, internal and forced rhymes completely smothers beats with his scathing poetic skills. A byproduct of Earl’s rap mastery is that it forces Tyler to slow down his own delivery and lean into his considerable talent for stacking verses with blink and you miss them punchlines and intricate rhyme patterns. Take his verse on “Couch,”
I got you niggas nervous like virgins flirtin' with Uncle Mervin
Fuckin' y'all with no lubricant, go grab the detergent
I preach to demons at your church, now I'm the newest sermon
Wearin' nothin' but they fuckin' blast with the matchin' turban
I drive through white suburbans in the black Suburban swervin'
Hittin' curbs and blastin' Erick Sermon drunk off English Bourbon
I'm stealin' purses rapin' nurses I'm a crooked surgeon
And treat the beat like sanitized nazi pussies, I'm a German
I'm squirtin' while I'm masturbatin' and regurgitatin'
From eatin' Miley Cyrus salad pussy platter they were servin'
My only purpose is to jerk it cause it has a curve
So bitches hate to do me like it's convict community service
In the span of one verse, Tyler manages to rhyme Mervin, with sermon, turban, suburban, swervin, bourbon, surgeon, German, squirtin’, and servin’. He uses repetition of words like sermon and suburban to extend the rhyme pattern, while complicating his delivery with the alliteration of phrases like “Suburban swervin’” and “Pussy platter.” Tyler ends his second verse, with the line “Killed him on his own track,” and for as many times as Earl has run circles around Tyler it’s nice to see the OF leader flexing on arguably the best lyricist in the crew.
22. "Orange Juice" f/ Earl Sweatshirt
Album: Radical (2010)
Rap as a genre is basically high school purgatory and picking beats are akin to fishing for a suitable date to an endless prom. In 2010 the girl rappers were awkwardly trying to grind on was the Bangladesh produced “Lemonade.” Everyone from Big Sean to Fabolous to the oft-forgotten Donnis put their spin on the Gucci Mane song. Beat snatching mixtape culture was at its apex and Odd Future’s specific brand of sugar anarchy coincided with the time perfectly. On 2010’s Odd Future mixtape, Radical, EarlWolf joined like the Wonder Twins to flex on the bubblegum beat. Earl undoubtedly has the best verse on the song, but Tyler still finds time to drop gems like:
Dirty rotten nigga picked it from a cotton gin
Do not give a fuck I've got the swagger of a virgin's dick
But if I did it would be bigger than Earl's upper lip
21. "Martians vs. Goblins" f/ Lil Wayne & Tyler the Creator
20. "Radicals"
19. "AssMilk" f/ Earl Sweatshirt
18. "Jamba" f/ Hodgy Beats
17. "Garden Shed"
Album: Flower Boy (2017)
The fulcrum of Flower Boy, "Garden Shed" unfolds loosely, a confident slow build of hazy guitars and atmospheric voices setting the stage for Tyler's rapid-fire unloading of seemingly everything on his chest. He doesn't begin rapping until the last minute of the song, but the tightly wound, rapid-fire flow ensures he packs a series of punches. It's done so self-assuredly, and reveals so much, it feels like a statement of purpose and one of Tyler's most coherent and affecting pieces of work. —Brendan Klinkenberg
15. "Sandwitches" f/ Hodgy Beats
Album: Goblin (2010)
A singular ability few emcees possess and even fewer master is the art of being in on the joke. Early Eminem had it. Lil B never lost it. Vince Staples is perfecting it. This isn’t to say these artists aren’t meant to be taken seriously, in fact quite the opposite. Life is inherently absurd and nonsensical. There is beauty in embracing the chaos and hearing the laughter before everyone else. Tyler, the Creator’s opening on “Sandwitches speaks to this phenomenon in all its glory.
Who the fuck invited Mr. I Don’t Give a Fuck
Who cries about his daddy in a blog
Because his music sucks? (I did)
The lyric is hilariously true, because it demonstrates how much Tyler was aware of the storm that encircled his collective.
14. "French" f/ Hodgy Beats
13. "Smuckers" f/ Kanye West & Lil Wayne
12. "FUCKING YOUNG/PERFECT" f/ Toro y Moi, Kali Uchis, Syd, & Charlie Wilson
Album: Cherry Bomb (2015)
The boy who ate a cockroach and puked bile that looked summoned from the deepest hell pits shouldn’t be capable of making something this beautiful. Wistful and longing in its sincerity Tyler, the Creator Toro y Moi, Kali Uchis, Syd, and Charlie Wilson come together for a song about love that can never be. “FUCKING YOUNG/PERFECT” details Tyler having feelings for a girl six years younger than him. In a 2015 Billboard article Tyler stated,
"I wanted to make a song like Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions album. You listen to shit in the ‘70s, they got to the point. Although it sounds soft, “Fucking Young” is perverted and weird, but it’s true. There was this girl that I liked, and we both had feelings for each other, but there was a five-year difference between us. It weirded me out, so I wrote a song about it."
Who knew Tyler and Uncle Charlie could sound so good together with such a weird topic? Sometimes it pays to go down the Wolf Haley rabbit hole.