The night before SS3’s release, 300 Entertainment CEO Lyor Cohen revealed snippets of the album on Snapchat with the confused aggression of a first-time hype man. And even the head of his label is hyping the mixtape, in unconventional ways. The tape is only eight tracks long, which could be an indication Young Thug is beginning to take the editing process a little more seriously ( Slime Season was 18 tracks long, while SS2 was 22). Executives at Atlantic recently shifted Thugger to their 300 Entertainment imprint, which reportedly gives artists more freedom than traditional labels.Įven if it is still just a mixtape, Slime Season 3 feels more like an official release than anything Thugger has put out previously. In the past year or so, things have cleared up incrementally. Then, in 2014 he told Mass Appeal he was signed to Cash Money Records, which turned out to be untrue, but not before stirring things up. In 2013, Thug signed a production deal with Gucci Mane’s 1017 Brick Squad label, only to sign with Atlantic’s APG imprint a few months later for a scrappy $15,000 advance. His history with labels has been fraught with broken contracts and bad deals.
Could SS3’s full availability mean Young Thug is starting to play the industry game a little bit? Young Thug has always been portrayed as an industry outsider who doesn’t so much actively refuse to work within the bounds of music industry sanctions as ignore them completely, as you might ignore a fly in your ear. Slime Seasons 1 and 2 are each missing several tracks on Spotify, likely due to clearance issues.
The tape, Slime Season 3, is available to download for free on DatPiff, and to stream on Spotify and Apple Music - it’s the first time the entirety of a Slime Season tape has been available on a streaming service. Thug's discography is getting as unwieldy as his flow This week Thugger released yet another mixtape, the third in his Slime Season trilogy, and it’s structured enough to take the place of a more official release. His promised studio debut, Hy!£UN35, has been delayed several times now, often seeming to take a back burner to his industrious side hustle.
Through all this, he has yet to release a proper full-length. Since 2011, the Atlanta rapper born Jeffrey Williams has released well over 10 mixtapes, and popped up on albums by everyone from Rae Sremmurd to Jamie XX.
At this point, Young Thug’s discography is getting as unwieldy as his flow.