Ice Spice raps like she’s got better things to do than worry about how people perceive her. “Munch,†her 2022 breakthrough single, informs a paramour that he’s not the good time he believes he is. It’s N.W.A’s “A Bitch Iz a Bitch†or Slick Rick’s “Treat Her Like a Prostitute†read through the lingua franca of the deeply online: terse dismissiveness and a devilish delight in watching people get themselves worked up for no reason. Ice Spice dresses you down in as few words as possible, communicating the disdain she intends but also a newness on the job. Her jilted 2021 debut “Bully Freestyle†used the TikTok challenge inspired by Texas rapper Erica Banks’s “Buss It†and an ominous drill beat by Bronx-based producer RiotUSA as springboards for a career thus far dedicated to disaffected verses stuffed with relatable one-liners that don’t swing hard enough to trip. Last year’s curt, bubbly Like..? EP tightened the formula, earning notable admirers and collaborators in Nicki Minaj and Taylor Swift that proved Ice Spice’s bite-size insouciance paired well with singles from more established chart toppers. Subsequent team-ups with PinkPantheress, Central Cee, Rema, and Cash Cobain communicate both a playfulness and a budding adaptability. This summer, Ice uses her relaxed approach on another career milestone: her just-released debut studio album, Y2K! A diminutive running time, a blunt sense of humor, and a relative disinterest in roaming too far from the original script save it from the demographic wanderlust and star-studded bloat plaguing recent major rap and pop albums. At a point in her career where predecessors have gone to great lengths to showcase versatility, Ice Spice sticks to her strengths.
Y2K! toes the line, documenting a young artist working out how to express that she’s unbothered without also seeming disinterested in delivering impressive performances on the mic. (This is a reasonable concern in the year when Massachusetts rapper Bia drew guffaws from hyping up a patchy Cardi B diss the target has understandably paid dust so far.) But the 23-minute album is least engaging when it’s trying to fit in. Straining to match the castoff arrogance of Gunna lyrics in “Bitch I’m Packin,†Spice feels like a guest on her own song. “BB Belt†echoes the Jersey club and toilet humor of the single “Think U the Shit (Fart),†delivering diminishing returns and crowding the hit on the tracklist. It’s frustrating to find even a few minutes of filler on an album roughly the same length as an episode of Abbott Elementary.
The most accomplished tracks excel at a carefree braggadocio and bottomless defiance foundational to hip-hop, fitting since Ice Spice hails from the Bronx, the birthplace of the culture. “Popa†is New York drill by numbers — kick-drum bass, bleating synth brass, hi-hats balancing double and triple time — and full of dismissive taunts: “And he left that bitch cause I’m a cooler bitch.†The sound animates the rapper. Much like the EP, Y2K! is looking to deliver a slick sequence of subgenre exercises. “Gimme a Light†is a volley of boasts affixed to a Riot production sampling Sean Paul’s 2002 smash hit: “Bad bitch, came straight outta Fordham / Now I’m rockin’ Balenci’ / I remember I couldn’t afford ’emâ€; “And, no, I don’t got any opps / Like, why would I beef with a flop?†“Light†captures the essence of New York City, of hearing a radio dancehall-hour staple pumping in distended and distorted from a distance. Ice Spice may be a generational phenomenon making music that resonates with audience marked by melted attention spans, but her cadences and humor are unabashedly uptown — rooted in the same brutally direct banter you hear while someone is getting torched at a bodega or Chinese restaurant north of Central Park.
It’s admirable that Y2K! centers its local character as much as it does, that it feels distinctly from one place, undergirding its most conceited dispatches with a flash of their hardscrabble origins. Tightening the bars would improve the hit ratio, but we don’t need 45 minutes of trend-savvy international or regional chart fodder from Ice Spice. For an artist whose central shtick is a delighted inaccessibility — who closes Y2K! by signing off to make more money somewhere else — that would be trying too hard.