Kid Cudi has been a bit of a WTF story over the past few years. Mr. Rager exploded onto the scene with a couple of mixtapes and a couple solid albums, some that people may even call classics of the 2010 era. He caught the attention of Kanye West and Jay Z while appealing to the indie crowd with MGMT samples. At one point, he was destined to be the next greatest thing in rap music. Then he stopped making rap.
As if that wasn't enough, Cudi seems to have decided to completely abandon rap, almost as a means to prove he doesn't have to. You know how children want to have a cookie when you tell them they can't? That seems to be the approach Cudi has taken with music lately. "Oh, you want me to make rap? Haha! Not going to!"
Speedin' Bullet To Heaven is the newest release, and its completely void of hip hop, or even reasonable listenability. It's garnering some passionately negative reviews, and today we're looking into what Cudi may have been listening to while he wrote these songs.
Beach House
The indie duo Beach House has been sampled by Kendrick Lamar on "Money Trees" and on The Weeknd's "The Party and The After Party," so they aren't so far removed from hip hop culture. On the album's more melodic, downtempo attempts, it comes across like Mr. Cudi has been digging Beach House, who released two albums this year in Depression Cherry and Thank Your Lucky Stars.
Elliott SmithÂ
"Wedding Tux," for example, uses that absolutely miserable Elliott Smith vibe that the singer/songwriter employed on the majority of his releases. The acoustic vibes on Speedin' Bullet to Heaven seem not so unlike Smith, who killed himself in 2003. Cudi, however, can't touch the beauty of Smith's work.
Bad Brains
There's no denying that Speedin' Bullet to Heaven has a punky edge to it. If Cudi is up on his punk rock, especially that of the hardcore variety, then he was probably listening to Bad Brains while recording some of these tracks. "Angered Kids" isn't so far away, and "Seance Chaos" is pretty much Bad Brains worship.
Velvet Underground
As one of the most influential bands for both punk and indie music, Velvet Underground almost certainly has a place in Cudi's record collection. "Fade 2 Red" and "Man In The Night" have that same lofi, mid-tempo guitar-driven sound that Velvet Underground used to become one of the most important bands in American history.
Deftones
As one of the few bands that survived nu-metal to continue making valuable music, Deftones mix eerie misery with shoegazy, alternative metal. On Cudi's tracks "Adventures" and "The Nothing," you can hear the droned vibe of Chino Moreno's vocals over minimal, reverberated guitar.
Nirvana
The most obvious choice at a potential Speedin' Bullet influence is Kurt Cobaine and Nirvana. Cudi's miserable record totally nods to Kurt & co. on a number of occasions, including "Edge of the Earth," "CONFUSED!," "Screwed," "Adventures," and more. Of course, Cudi's record probably won't have near the impact Nirvana has had on music, unless it proves to be one of those hindsight cult success stories that becomes widely influential in the year 2025 or something.