Earl Sweatshirt Will See You Now

On his new album, "Live Laugh Love," the cult rapper ascends from grief and self-doubt, taking stock of his journey.

Two years ago this past Friday, my mother died after a short illness. She had been in the hospital battling a number of complications, only to make it home and succumb to renal failure her first day of hospice. I know I’ve written and talked about my mother’s death a lot, but I can’t seem to move past the trauma. It’s one thing to know that your closest loved one is leaving, it’s another to see it happen. I can’t forget her breathing slowing down, her face freezing, and the paralyzing grief that set in. It changed me in ways that I’m still processing, and some days I wonder if I’ll get over it, or if that’s even possible.

It’s the type of agony I’d only seen play out through films, conversations and albums. Before my own suffering, I would listen to records like Earl Sweatshirt’s I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside and wonder how someone could sound so despondent, angry and tortured. Then I realized that Earl felt helpless, sore from the loss of his grandmother, shackled by the throes of addiction. In 2015, when this album was released, I could listen to a song like “Grief” and appreciate the creative intent, but I did not relate to the pain he exhibited. Though I felt his stomping through the dark, I couldn’t duplicate the steps just yet. So I listened without much connection, revisiting the album when traffic worsened or professional frustrations arose. I had forgotten the “why” of the album until recently.

As with any sort of heartache, soon the clouds break and, for a moment, you think maybe you’re on the other side of it. Work becomes a nice, pretty distraction we throw ourselves into, yet time can’t fully heal the wounds. Two years on, I still can’t sit in silence for long, and I can’t sip coffee in my aunt’s house (where my mom lived) without her voice ringing in my head. When I’m alone in those morning hours, I look up and see her looking down into the kitchen from the second floor. I see her in that pink robe sitting on the edge of the chez chair, watching TV with the sound barely on. I’ve learned to not suppress the tears when sadness arises, and to lean into whatever emotion surfaces that day. Try as I might, there’s no escaping what’s there: The books, the writing, the music, all that is cool (and I’m truly thankful that people care), but the discomfort is palpable. The demons don’t disappear. The sorrow persists but you need to face your challenges.

This is the theme of Earl’s new album, Live Laugh Love, his fifth solo studio LP. A brief listen, at just 24 minutes across 11 tracks, Earl ascends from melancholy by leaning into it, acknowledging that he can’t outrun the past through arbitrary amusement. Once the comfort food loses taste and the sitcom concludes, he still needs to address what ails him — in a healthy way. In years’ past, as referenced on his previous album, 2022’s Sick!, Earl may have isolated himself or doused his shortcomings with liquor. Here, he tackles said problems by acknowledging them, or, as a guest vocalist exclaims on the opening track “gsw vs sac,” by no longer hiding. “You ain’t running from nowhere but your own self,” he tells Earl, “and that’s where you exactly need to be.” In a way then, Live Laugh Love continues the story he started three years ago, and orchestrates the healing the rapper sought on that LP. But it also punctuates I Don’t Like Shit… as a breaking from despair and the sadness of losing family. If the 2015 album found Earl at the height of his grief, this one finds him at the apex of joy and prosperity.

A full circle moment, he sounds lighter, focused and more exuberant. Even on a song like “Well Done!,” where his voice is downcast, Earl doesn’t come off sedated. Groggy, sure: The rapper’s monotone mumble has inspired a generation of like-minded lyricists to rap in low, conversational tones over obscure soul samples — and that doesn’t change on this song or LP. But his inflection is pointed, almost combative. And when he wags his finger at an unknown foe, saying, “you never gon’ get a rise out of a real one … ain’t gon’ lie you prolly should get ya sales up,” it’s the most antagonistic I’ve heard him. While Earl talks more shit on Live Laugh Love, he never punches down; instead, he sounds confident, as if stepping into his own to remind us and himself who he really is.

Earl is a true Pisces creative person in that regard: We tend to humble ourselves to a fault, minimizing our impact even as peers and onlookers loudly celebrate the work we’ve put forth. Earl, 31, has been famous since he was 16, and rarely have I heard him take credit for the influence he’s had on hip-hop culture. When it was brought up in years’ past, he’d quickly shout out other rappers for inspiring his sound. So the song “Heavy Metal aka ejecto seato!,” where Earl references a time almost 10 years ago when he doubted his creative path, isn’t surprising.

Artists of my sign tend to question themselves, downplaying the unique left turns for which they’re known. It’s why Erykah Badu, on the track “A.D. 2000,” once proclaimed “you won’t be naming no buildings after me,” and why Tyler, The Creator, throughout his 2024 album Chromakopia, lamented his loneliness despite a life of fame and Grammy awards. There can be this feeling of darkness around the corner, like it’s all set to vanish, and any sort of acknowledgement somehow facilitates the dissolving — like you’re “still in a void,” as Earl mutters on the song “Live.” When he remembers the past, it’s a brave act, a recollection through praying hands, a thank God I got past that. “I released it,” he repeats, referencing stress and uncertainty. “I never got on LinkedIn.” Of course, there’s nothing wrong with job hunting on the social media site, but when you’re one of the world’s foremost musicians, posting a résumé would be a down moment.

There’s something to be said about the breakthrough, how the winding, iconoclastic path suddenly isn’t so singular. Indeed, one day you look up and see adoring eyes staring back and you wonder how they arrived. Or why they’re there. When I hear “exhaust,” the album’s concluding track, I hear fatigue of the best kind. Here, it seems, the job is done: Earl’s family is safe and healthy and his influence radiates. He’s looking back, taking stock of the journey, reveling in the accomplishment — in his own way, of course. “Worked harder than a bitch,” he declares with a sigh. “At the end of the day,” Earl raps later on the track, “it’s really just you and whatever you think. I'm airmailing you strength.”

There he is again, leaning into the moment — no more running, no more cozy diversions, just him and the thoughts he sought to evade. But Earl realized that blessings are evident, and instead of overthinking the negative, he’s focused on what could go right. I’ve noticed myself doing that as well. Even as the pain of loss comes up occasionally, I think of my mother with a smile and consider how far I’ve come over the past two years. It’s okay to accept nice things. Sounds like Earl knows that, too.