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At midnight on Christmas, Playboi Carti declared himself Santa Claus. After years of hype, false starts and cryptic messages to fans, the rapper has finally shared his album Whole Lotta Red, the highly anticipated 2018 follow-up Die lit. The 24-track, 62-minute disc inspired an almost immediate bifurcation on social networks. There were die-hard Carti fans who called it his best job from 1 a.m. Critics lamented its long runtime and apparent lack of focus to an equally rapid extent. Minutes after the outing, Carti’s ex-girlfriend, musician Iggy Azalea, who Carti has a child with, took to Twitter to express her frustration at the rapper’s alleged absence on the first Christmas of their son. All of this made for a particularly active week on the Playboi Carti Reddit, which over the past few years has been the source of every iota of information that has leaked out of the notoriously secretive rapper’s camp.
David Ha, a 20-year-old student at Ryerson University in Toronto, started the Playboi Carti subreddit in 2016, after launching similar pages for artists like 21 Savage and Bryson Tiller, although he says it’s the Playboi Carti subreddit that he invested the most effort in “because he was my favorite artist”. Like the more than 160,000 members of the community, Ha has followed the almost mythical trajectory of Whole Lotta Red, an album that many in the community resigned themselves to believing would never come. Now that he’s arrived, taking Carti to No. 1 on the RS 200 leaderboard, Ha has told us about running one of the most active and loyal fan communities on the internet.
How has it been to navigate all the information about Carti – from leaks to rumors and fake release dates – over the past few years?
I have the impression that it is divided into different eras. After Die lit came out, he had a lot of traction, and a lot of people were coming to the sub. And then between that and Whole Lotta Red, the sub started to get famous for memes to be honest, because everyone was sick of the wait. I guess a lot of us were just looking for the latest leak or the snippet.
A lot of fans would create their own tracks from these snippets and leaks. Have you seen people develop as producers through the subreddit?
I’m not entirely sure in terms of development, just because we have so many people in the sub that I haven’t followed. But I think there is a lot of talent in this fanbase. I’ve seen a lot of kids post their art and their remixes and stuff like that. I think Carti has a really talented fan base.
For the years leading up to the release of Whole Lotta Red, the album basically existed as a meme. Have you ever given up hope that it will be released?
Part of Whole Lotta Red as a meme never had too much hope in the first place. We were all like, “Okay, that never goes down.” Better not even to hope. He was tweeting something cryptic and made it look like it was coming out next week, then next week is coming and there’s no album. But I think everyone had their hopes. I didn’t think it was gonna fall before [2021], so I’m really happy.
What do you think of the album?
I really liked the album from the first time I heard it when it came out and it has only grown on me since then. I feel like Carti did some punk rap on this project and I found the music on this album to match her new aesthetic very well. I’m really happy to see him evolve as a musician and artist.
How did the community react?
The response has been mixed from the community. Many fans who didn’t appreciate the album weren’t expecting such a drastic departure from their last project and expected music similar to the leaks that would surface before the album’s release. I think a lot of those who liked the album had the same reasons for loving it as I did, and they appreciate its ability to still be able to experiment with its music and develop its sound further regardless of its growing popularity. I feel like if you are a true fan of Carti himself you would have loved this album rather than just being a fan of Eponym or Die lit, but ultimately music is subjective.
Did you have to take any special precautions while browsing Iggy’s tweets?
As a mod, the Iggy situation just added to the existing drama surrounding the album’s release. Our subreddit had increased the karma limit for posting a few days after the album’s release to promote better content and less shitposting. All in all, this situation just gave people more things to discuss and make memes regarding the release of. WLR. Personally, I think this situation is not something that should have been broadcast on social media in the first place, I just hope Carti will take this as a sign of doing better as a father because what he does [allegedly] fact was a bit crappy.
Where does Carti’s fanbase go from here?
I think Carti’s fan base will continue to grow rapidly as he begins to move into the mainstream. Carti for me has always been ahead of his time and an innovator, so if people don’t get it now, they will eventually. Hope to see him put together a fan base that can value his progress as an artist who is not afraid to take risks, to prevent this kind of backlash from happening again, although it is inevitable lol.
Would you like to see artists like Playboi Carti recognize their online fan communities?
It would be good. But I have the impression that they have no obligation to do so. But I would definitely appreciate it, yeah.
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