Nearly three years ago, Young Thug released the compilation album “Slime Language” under his label “YSL.” The album showcased many of Thug’s young acts through his label, and after three years and mind boggling growth from a lot of the artists featured, he returned in 2021 with a sequel to the project. Featuring 23 songs and 31 artists, the best thing to do is to listen to this album as a compilation, and not as a full blown album.

The album opens up with “Slatty.” It’s got great production from Atlanta producer Southside, and holds a catchy chorus. Aside from those highlights, it’s a fairly mediocre track with mediocre verses from Thug, Yak Gotti, and Lil Duke, but the energy on the track from all the artists is contagious. “Ski” follows it, and is not only the most popular song on the album, but one of the best. It gives off the same vibes as the 2019 hit “Hot,” and almost seems like a part two between Gunna and Thug. It’s no surprise that this song has sparked thousands of videos on TikTok.

The album stays pretty top heavy, continuing the hot streak with “Diamonds Dancing,” tagging a feature from Travis Scott. Although Travis’ feature is fairly mundane, it’s still a solid highlight track considering the quality of the album. With how big of a feature that was, no feature could have been as big as Drake on “Solid.” It provides great verses from all three artists, pretty marking the high point of the album.

One of the best features comes from Rowdy Rebel on “Came and Saw.” It has that grimy New York spice that Rowdy has perfected, and Thug provides one of his best verses on the entire album. The album starts to drop off after that however, as the sixth song “Paid the Fine” is just a let down. The three headed monster of Thug, Gunna, and Lil Baby provided subpar performances, and the top performance of the track actually came from young artist YTB Trench.

The seventh song was one of the most hyped of the entire album. “Proud of You” is a solid song, with Lil Uzi Vert dropping the best hook of the whole album, talking about how Young Thug called him to tell him how proud he is of Uzi’s growth over the years. Aside from his performance however, it’s just a fairly typical song from the album. It leads into “Real” with a feature from Unfoonk. The vocals on the track just don’t work, with Foonk singing the chorus, it just sounds weird through his raspy voice. 

“I Like” is possibly the show stealer of the project. Female artists Karlae and Coi Leray provide incredible performances on the song, with exceptional vocals from both of them. All the track does is make me wish we were able to hear Leray on more than one song. “Warrior” completely flipped the tone, going from a slower, more vibe filled song into a trap banger, led by a killer performance by Lil Keed. Big Sean lets down on the song, but the duo of T-Shyne and Keed shined on the song.

“Pots and Pans” was a track with a surprising outcome, showing off the chemistry between Lil Duke and NAV. The vocal differences going from NAV’s sleepy, robotic voice to Duke’s loud and raspy energy works surprisingly well, and created a solid midpoint track for the project. It’s followed up by an insanely forgettable track, “WokStar” by Skepta and Strick. It’s just a boring song that embodies the problem with this album; too much filler.

Future got the internet laughing with his performance on “Superstar,” providing an hilarious vocal inflection on the hook, almost similar to his widely memed verse from 2018’s “King’s Dead” with Kendrick Lamar. You either love it or you hate it, but I think it makes the song fairly entertaining. It transitions into another wavy track, where Keed returns to dominate his flow on “Came Out” with Gunna. They totally tag team the beat with each other, creating another combination of artists that work extremely well together.

The next four tracks are total snoozers though, starting off with “Really Be Slime” featuring a co-performance from incarcerated YNW Melly and his 14-year-old brother, BSlime. All the way through the song GFU, the four track run is the most boring on the album, with the only memorable performance being Karlae’s second on the tape, where she absolutely kills her verse on “Trance.” 

“Moon Man,” was the biggest let down of a track on the entire album. Seeing Kid Cudi on a track list makes almost any hip hop fan excited. Sadly, listening through 18 songs just to be rewarded with that felt like walking on hot coals just for a candy bar, only for the wrapper to be empty. The only memorable song on the remainder of the album was from the single “That Go!” which was previously released in January. It features some of the best verses on the album from Meek Mill and Thugger, and T-Shyne brings an energetic and catchy hook.

The star power was increased on this album compared to the original Slime Language, but the worst decision was the idea to hold the album at 75 minutes of length across 23 tracks. This compilation could have easily been cut in half and it would have instantly made the album better, but it also does its job of showcasing many artists signed to the YSL label. It’s a mediocre 5/10, with some great hits and a lot of misses. The bloated contents just held it back from being a very good album, and we can only imagine that Slime Language 3 will probably have the same issues in a few years.