By March 8, 2018
Charlotte rapper and producer Yung Citizen is back at it again with his latest song “OutKast.” The song comes to us with a video produced by NeverEnd and features two fellow locals, MoonLander and Rob Flo. The song was written in a single night and features some ear-catching lyrics relative to 2018, whether it be Trump’s presidency or the status of the current music industry.
Citizen’s presence in Charlotte music has been behind the scenes over the past couple of years, producing for local artists rather than focusing heavily on his own name. However, last year Citizen released a collaboration called Alive Sessions where he brought on a group of local producers, rappers and singers together to produce the six-song EP. When it comes to his personal work, Yung Citizen’s lyricism centers around being on the outside looking in, especially where it concerns social justice issues or, more pointedly, the exclusive expectations and standards of hip-hop.
“OutKast” reflects that exclusion with lyrics like “They will probably never play this on the radio; all this music’s saturated, that’s the way it goes.” While the song is upbeat and catchy, featuring a contagious hook by MoonLander as well as some serious bars from Rob Flo, the message is still clear: Citizen feels ideologically ostracized from his peers and misunderstood by the masses, sentenced to remain on the margins of mainstream hip-hop as fans of the genre continues to consume an inundation of recycled material.
This single is the first from Yung Citizen’s upcoming LP, Millennial: The (Un)American Dream. If it’s a reflection of the rest of the record, listeners can expect something that’s going to draw attention as the young artist continues to push onward in his journey to help change the industry paradigm.
Watch the music video for “OutKast” by Yung Citizen, MoonLander, and Rob Flo.
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